Anti-Slavery History
Acts of the Anti-Slavery Apostles
by
Rev. Parker Pillsbury
(Concord, N.H., 1883)

Rev. Parker Pillsbury This site is one in a series on the abolitionists from before the 1861-1865 Civil War. This site presents a book by one of them, Rev. Parker Pillsbury (1809-1898).
Abolitionists such as Harriet Beecher Stowe (1811-1896) had shown slavery to be a sin. But many, even "most," clergymen were evil, pro-slavery.
By the time Pillsbury wrote this book, in 1883, many Americans had forgotten the events leading to that war; pro-South disinformation was being circulated instead. This was in two contradictory styles:
  • claims the Bible is FOR slavery, and
  • claims that "Christian" churches had fought against slavery.

  • Telling two different stories at the same time is classic fraud. Both stories cannot be true! But both stories may be false, as in this situation.
    The real truth was,
  • the Bible was ANTI-slavery, but
  • pretended Christians had flouted Bible teachings, and had massively SUPPORTED slavery and had LIED about the Bible to do so.

  • Evil clergy had even supported U.S. wars of conquest, e.g., stealing Texas from Mexico, in a war of aggression, pp 81 and 381.
    This is not to mention other Southern evils cited by other abolitionists, and later killing hundreds of thousands of people.
    Pillsbury had excommunicated the vile clergy, p 374, the vast majority in the U.S.A. He, and real Christians (Protestant and Catholic, as shown in this series), had fought slavery.
    The real Christians, not the pretenders, were now, 1883, being forgotten. As in the book Nineteen Eighty-Four [1984] by George Orwell, the truth of history was being rewritten, falsified. The facts of the time were being reversed, to state the opposite of what had happened, to conceal the facts of the majority clergy's wicked record from their gullible members / sheeple. (This type lying continues to present!)
    Harriet Martineau (1802-1876), in Society in America (1837), § XVI, "Administration of Religion," had warned that once slavery was abolished, clergy might try to steal the credit: "if the clergy of America follow the example of other rearguards of society, they will be the first to glory in the reformation which they have done their utmost to retard." Now, decades later, this predicted credit-stealing was occurring.
    “After the war, former Confederates [had] wondered how to hold on to their . . . pride after [the] devastating defeat. . . . So they reverse-engineered a cause worthy of [their] heroics. They also sensed . . . that the end of slavery would confer a gloss of nobility, and bragging rights, on the North," says Donald von Drehle, "The Civil War, 1861-2011, The Way We Weren't" (Time, 18 April 2011), p 40. So pro-slavers, unreconstructed Confederates, and their apologists and accessories resolved on denial and disinformation, including pretending that the pro-slavery clergy had helped end slavery!!!   “The readiness with which Southern [slavers and defenders] prefer the most false and audacious claims . . . exhibits a state of society in which truth and honor are but little respected,” says Lewis Tappan, Address to the Non-slaveholders of the South: on The Social and Political Evils of Slavery (New York: S.W. Benedict, 1843), p 36. Of course they'd lie! and keep on doing so! both before and after the Civil War.
    So Pillsbury, by then (1883) age 73, wrote this history to set the record straight in abolitionists' honor, and to remind Americans of the fakes, the pretenders, whom he had excommunicated, p 374.
    The real truth was: "[N]othing . . . has done so much to tolerate and perpetuate the sin in our midst, as the practice [tradition] of the Church."—Rev. John G. Fee (1816-1901), Anti-Slavery Manual (1851), p 69. See parody, pp 326-327.
    Accordingly, President Abraham Lincoln gave no credit for ending slavery to the churches, but instead, quite the opposite, had credited the anti-clerical William Lloyd Garrison (1805-1879) and others: "The logic and moral power of Garrison and the Anti-slavery people . . . And the army have done it all," freed the slaves, cited by Truman Nelson (History Writer), Documents of Upheaval: Selections from William Lloyd Garrison's THE LIBERATOR, 1831-1865 (NY: Hill and Wang, 1966), xvii
    Churches were creating pagans, infidels, by their bad examples and doctrines, said Rev. William W. Patton (1846).
    Such evils are a legacy of the various Roman Emperors, including Diocletian's persecution of the Early Church.
    U.S. slavery was unconstitutional. John Wesley called it the "the vilest."
    Such history is vital now, in 2009, as the fakes, the pretended Christians, continue. Some still say the Bible is FOR slavery; others pretend to have 'repented' of their predecessors having been pro-slavery! Both groups lie, pretend the bulk of U.S. clergy were anti-slavery! despite the truth having been the extreme opposite!
    Neither group (the deniers of slavery-being-a-sin, and the pretenders-of-having-opposed-slavery) bring forth "fruits meet for repentance [Luke 3:8]." They bring forth
    To go to the "Table of Contents" immediately, click here.

    Acts of the Anti-Slavery Apostles
    by
    Rev. Parker Pillsbury
    (Concord, N.H., 1883)


    "And they went everywhere preaching the word."—Acts, viii:4.



    INTRODUCTION.

    Some books, judged by their titles, are more remarkable for what they do not contain, than for what they do. This work is only Acts, not the Acts of the Anti-Slavery Apostles. It is only a small portion of a very small part of those apostles.

    There were many in the great west, as well as not a few in the east, whose labors, sacrifices and sufferings entitle them to volumes of well-written biography, who can scarcely be mentioned here, even by name.

    At this time of my life of nearly three score and fourteen years, more than forty of which have been spent in the field of moral, peaceful and religious agitation for the rights of humanity, it seemed presumption in me to attempt a labor of even this magnitude. And it was only earnest, continued importunity on the part of my very few surviving associates in the conflict, and their friends, that finally determined my course. Truth only has been sought. Not the whole truth; for that were impossible. But strict truth and exact justice, to the full extent of my time and space.

    The present generation knows little of the terrible mysteries and meanings of slavery or anti-slavery; the outrages and horrors of the former, or the desperate and deadly encounters with the monster by the latter, long before the cannonade of Fort Sumpter, or the dreadful war chorus of the subsequent rebellion. And all which is now attempted is some disclosure of those mysteries.

    By anti-slavery apostles are meant those only whose work was in the lecturing field; who literally "went everywhere preaching the word;" often as with their

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    lives in their hands. Nor will only few of them, however worthy and deserving, be mentioned even by name. This work will be rather pictures and sketches than history. It will hardly enter more than two states, New Hampshire and Massachusetts; never go beyond New England. But in New England every type and phase of anti-slavery experience, doing, suffering and triumphing was represented to the fullest possible extent. What was true there was true everywhere in the country.

    And the truth on slavery and anti-slavery can be presented on so small space, and in time equally limited, as well as if the whole country were included, and all the thirty years of the moral and peaceful, and so, truly religious, agitation of the mighty problem were covered and all the heroes and martyrs named. The whole, as originally intended, would have comprised acts and experiences of some of those heroes, with brief personal sketches of them, together with short biographical notices of William Lloyd Garrison, of The Liberator and Nathaniel Peabody Rogers, of the Herald of Freedom.

    [Lying Clergy]

    But, as the work of writing went on, articles began to appear from our old opponents or their children, not only declaring that they or their fathers abolished the evil, but that it could have been sooner and more easily done, "had Garrison and his small, but motley following" been out of their way!

    So some chapters of acts of the pro-slavery apostles, became necessary; at cost of both extending the volume, and also excluding some worthy names and noble deeds that had earned good right to grace these pages. These misrepresentations came mainly from the clergy, as did most of our bitterest opposition while prosecuting our anti-slavery labors, as will be hereafter shown beyond all question or contradiction.

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    So now the order of the book will be:

  • A chapter on Mr. Garrison [1805-1879];

  • a second, on Mr. Rogers [1794-1846];

  • a third on slavery—as it was;

  • then one on anti-slavery, what it was not, and what it was; and

  • then follow the acts of the anti-slavery apostles;

  • with acts of the pro-slavery apostles subjoined; the latter generally telling their own story in their own words, works and ways, no cross-questioning ever entering into their truly Judgment-day assizes, as will be made fully to appear to a surrounding world.
  • And it scarcely need be added that the abundant testimony adduced, is only a small part of what the churches and their ministers have treasured up against themselves, to be hereafter unfolded from their own archives, should occasion for it ever arise.

    CONCORD, N.H., 1883.P. P.

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    Abolitionist Reunion - 1893
    Danvers, Massachusetts Historical Society



    CONTENTS
    —•—

        CHAPTER
        INTRODUCTION iii
    I.William Lloyd Garrison 9
    II.Nathaniel Peabody Rogers 28
    III.Slavery—As it Was 47
    IV.Anti-Slavery—What it Was Not, and What it Was 72
    V.Acts of the Anti-Slavery Apostles, with some
    Personal Sketches and Experiences
    85
    VI.Conventions and Meetings with Rogers and
    Foster—Digression or New Organization
    102
    VII.Acts of the Apostles Continued, with
    Personal Sketches of Stephen Symonds Foster
    123
    VIII.Acts of the Apostles Continued—Letter of Concord
    Women—Clerical Usurpation—More
    Revelations of New Organisation—Riotous
    Proceedings at Dover—By the Editor of the
    Herald of Freedom
    156
    IX.Meetings in West Chester—Riotous and Shameful
    Conduct—Ride to Derry, and what came of it—
    Franklin Mob Described in a Letter by Mr.
    Foster
    182

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    X.Dartmouth College—Riotous Behavior of the Students
    —Strafford County Anniversary—Eastern
    Railroad and its Jim Crow Cars—Outrage on
    Colored Passengers
    204
    XI.Discussion on Church Organization by Rev. Mr.
    Putnam and Rev. Mr. Sargent—Hillsborough
    County Convention at Hancock—and Meeting at
    Nashua, by Mr. Foster, and what came of it
    241
    XII.The Martyr Period—Imprisonment of Allen, Brown,
    Beach, Harriman and Foster
    283
    XIII.Conventions at Nantucket and New Bedford—
    Frederick Douglass Discovered — Letter from
    Mr. Garrison—Meetings and Mob Demonstra-
    tions in Salem—Operations in Maine—Mobs in
    Portland and Harwich
    324
    XIV.Some Acts of the Pro-Slavery Apostles—Personal
    Encounter with the Hennicker, N. H. Church and
    Suffolk, Mass., Association of Ministers-—Rev.
    Dr. Bacon and Son on Slavery and Who
    Abolished it—the Church and Clergy in the
    Mexican War
    364
    XV.Acts of Pro-Slavery Apostles—General Assembly of
    the Presbyterian Church—American Board of
    Commissioners for Foreign Missions—the
    Baptist ChurchMethodist-Episcopal Church
    Protestant Episcopal Church—Campbellities—
    American Bible and Tract Societies—Fugitive
    Slave Law
    386
    XVI.Some Personal Sketches and Reminiscences—a Last
    Speech in an Anti-Slavery Anniversary
    Gathering
    479

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    ACTS OF THE ANTI-SLAVERY APOSTLES.

    —•—

    CHAPTER I.

    WILLIAM LLOYD GARRISON.

    The Acts of the twelve apostles are not the history of Christianity. Nor will the Acts of the Anti-Slavery Apostles be a history of the anti-slavery movement in the United States. My own beginning in that sublime enterprise was in the year 1840, when, dating from the establishment of The Liberator in Boston, by William Lloyd Garrison, it was about ten years old. At that time, so far as can be shown, was first announced the doctrine of immediate unconditional emancipation to every slave, without compensation to master or expatriation to the slave.

    Most of my anti-slavery work was of the missionary character, as was that of the first Christian apostles, who "went everywhere preaching the word." And the purpose of this Scripture is to present a true record, as far as practicable, of what passed under my own immediate observation, and in which it was my honor to bear some humble part. My earliest associates, editors as well as lecturers, are mostly now no more, and some personal account of a part of them is also in my present contemplation.

    My first anti-slavery newspapers were The Liberator, The Emancipator, published in New York, organ and property of the American Anti-Slavery Society, and Herald of

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    Freedom of Concord. New Hampshire. Through some changes occurring in 1840, The Emancipator passed out of the society's hands, but was immediately succeeded by the National Anti-Slavery Standard, which continued with unswerving integrity till slavery was abolished in the country by presidential proclamation, and the male slave at least was made secure in his right of suffrage and citizenship.

    The first issue of his Liberator by Mr. Garrison was on January 1, 1831. It was a most humble, unpretentious little sheet of four pages, about fourteen inches by nine in size, but charged with the destiny of a race of human beings whose redemption from chattel, brutal bondage, was one day to shake to its foundations the mightiest republic ever yet existing on the globe.

    William Lloyd Garrison My first introduction to Mr. Garrison was in the early spring of 1839. I had just concluded to undertake a short lecturing and financial agency for the Massachusetts Anti-Slavery Society, and was invited to a meeting of its executive committee, to mature my arrangements. It was an evening business session, in West street, Boston, and at the close Mr. Garrison invited me to his home, then of unassuming pretensions, in Seaver Place, to pass the night.

    The next day was Saturday, and I went by stage to Fitchburg, about fifty miles, and on Sunday evening delivered my first address on slavery, as agent of my association.

    And though I did in the course of that year, and the beginning of 1840, accept and occupy the position of a minister for a very small Congregational church and society in an obscure New Hampshire town, it seems on the whole more pertinent, proper and desirable, to date the beginning of my life mission and labor from that anti-slavery committee meeting in Boston and introduction to Mr. Garrison, and first work as an anti-

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    slavery agent in Fitchburg and through the county of Worcester in the spring of 1839.

    Of the boyhood history of Mr. Garrison this may not be the place to speak. Like many men of high eminence, he commenced life among the lowly. Nor was his native town, Newburyport, Massachusetts ever distinguished for any but most conservative ideas in government, religion or social policy.

    His excellent mother, a devout member of the Baptist church, early sent him to learn the trade of a shoemaker. Fortunately too early, for his knees could not support the lap-stone, the anvil of the shoemaker of that day, and he was soon discharged, and entered as an apprentice to a cabinet maker. But neither was this a success.

    Nor did he even approach nor tend to his future high calling, until, while still a youth, he entered a printing office. That, as has been truly said, was to him high school, college and university, from which he graduated with honors, after long and faithful apprenticeship.

    His first business enterprise was to establish a little newspaper in his native town, which he characteristically named the Free Press. He soon learned, how ever, that the time for a Free Press was not yet. But the voice of his genius still said, Cry! and he responded next in Boston, with the National Philanthropist devoted doctrinally and practically to entire abstinence from all intoxicating drinks. His motto was, "Moderate drinking, the down-hill road to drunkenness." This undertaking was in the year 1827, when he was twenty-two years old. But the Philanthropist like the Free Press proved a premature birth. In 1828, his powers of mind and heart coming to be better appreciated, he had and accepted a proposition to go to Bennington, Vermont, and establish a political paper to be known as The Journal

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    of the Times, and to advocate the claims of John Quincy Adams to the Presidency of the United States. Here, again, was a failure, and this journal soon slept with its predecessors.

    However, the valiant, persevering young editor was still full of courage and hope, and held on his way. He soon made acquaintance with Benjamin Lundy, an early, brave and true-hearted Quaker anti-slavery man, though hardly yet a pronounced abolitionist. Of kindred spirit, in the main, the two men formed a partnership in the autumn of 1829, and together published the Genius of Universal Emancipation.

    But though of one spirit, there was in methods between the two men a difference wide as earth and heaven. Mr. Lundy, in common with the highest humanities of the time, only demanded a gradual removal of slavery. Mr. Garrison, instead of gradual, almost stunned the nation with the new and more excellent evangel: "IMMEDIATE AND UNCONDITIONAL EMANCIPATION!"

    Here, then, was a new problem to be solved, or reconciled. An organized existence with one heart, but two voices: one serene, quiet, such as men might hear but not fear; the other the seven unloosed Apocalyptic thunders that men should hear, and hearing, tremble, as had Thomas Jefferson already, even in anticipation, almost half a century before the terrible utterance was heard by mortal ear! But Friend Lundy's persuasion prevailed for the present. After long, honest consideration and discussion, he finally said to Mr. Garrison: "Well, thee may put thy initials to thy editorial articles and I will put my initials to mine."

    But the stern logic of events soon showed that iron and clay could never be so welded together. This

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    was in Baltimore, a slave-breeding, slave-trading, slave-holding city; indeed, had already become a great shipping emporium of the domestic slave trade of the United States! where, as has been said, slave pens flaunted their signs in open day on the principal streets, their rich owners the best city society and most devout worshippers in Christian churches. The wonder was that the gradualism of Lundy could be tolerated. And he soon learned who had struck at the great tap root of the deadly upas. Mr. Garrison wrote:

    "My demand for immediate emancipation so alarmed and excited the people everywhere, that where Friend Lundy would get one new subscriber I would knock off a dozen."

    And so the Genius of Universal Emancipation would undoubtedly have soon been buried in the tomb of its three predecessors who owed their paternity to Mr. Garrison. But his intrepidity and fidelity in denouncing the domestic slave trade and exposure of its great cruelty, in the action of a ship captain engaged in it from his own native town of Newburyport, led to his arrest on a charge of libel, and conviction, fine, and imprisonment in a Baltimore jail. Nor had he one friend in the city to prevent it, if even to deplore his fate.

    Released from prison, his fine and court expenses being paid by Mr. Arthur Tappan of New York, and his partnership with Friend Lundy dissolved by mutual consent and in most cordial spirit, Mr. Garrison conceived the thought of establishing a paper at Washington, where the slave power and the domestic slave trade, in all their terrors, had established themselves under the sheltering wing and by direct authority of the Federal Government. Having in August, 1830, issued his prospectus, he visited the principal cities between Baltimore and Boston to test

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    the tone of the public feeling for such an enterprise. But though he found Boston scarcely more friendly to his doctrines and determinations against slavery than even Baltimore itself, he finally concluded that it, rather, than Washington, was the ground whereon The Liberator should be set up.

    Writing, after his tour of observation, he said:

    "During my recent tour for the purpose of exciting [informing] the minds of the people by a series of discourses on the subject of slavery, every place I visited gave fresh evidence of the fact that a greater revolution in public sentiment was to be effected in the Free States, and particularly in New England, than at the South. I found contempt more bitter, opposition more active, detraction more relentless, prejudice more stubborn, and apathy more frozen than among slave owners themselves. Of course there were individual exceptions to the contrary. This state of things afflicted but did not dishearten me.

    "I determined at every hazard to lift up the standard of emancipation in the eyes of the nation within sight of Bunker Hill and in the birth-place of liberty. That standard is now unfurled, and long may it float, unhurt by the spoilations of time or the missiles of a desperate foe, till every chain be broken and every bondman set free! Let Southern oppressors tremble. Let all the enemies of the persecuted blacks tremble!

    "Assenting to the self-evident truth maintained in the Declaration of Independence, that "all men are created equal and endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights, among which are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness," I shall strenuously contend for the immediate enfranchisement of our slave population. In Park Street Church, on the fourth of July, 1829, in an address on slavery, I unsuspectingly assented to the popular but pernicious doctrine of gradual abolition. I seize this opportunity to make a full and unequivocal recantation, and thus publicly to ask pardon of my God, of my country, and of the poor slaves, for having uttered a sentiment so full of timidity, injustice and absurdity. A similar recantation from

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    my pen was published in the Genius of Universal Emancipation, at Baltimore, in September, 1829. My conscience is now satisfied.

    "I am aware that many object to the severity of my language. But is there not cause for severity? I will be as harsh as truth, and as uncompromising as justice. On this subject I do not wish to think, or speak, or write with moderation. No! No! Tell a man whose house is on fire to give a moderate alarm; tell him to moderately rescue his wife from the hands of the ravisher; tell the mother to gradually extricate her babe from the fire into which it has fallen; but urge me not to use moderation in a cause like the present!

    "I am in earnest—I will not equivocate—I will not excuse—I will not retreat a single inch. And I WILL BE HEARD. The apathy of the people is enough to make every statue leap from its pedestal, and to hasten the resurrection of the dead!*

    Thus, at last, had come the hour and the man. The great clock of the eternities struck the hour. And out of the dread silences came the prophetic word which was to finish the work of Washington and the Revolution, proclaiming "LIBERTY throughout all the land, to all the inhabitants thereof [Leviticus 25:10]."

    In a Baltimore prison he had learned to "remember them that are in bonds, as bound with them [Hebrews 13:3];" and this was his self-consecration, in the earnest strains of Thomas Pringle:

    "Oppression! I have seen thee face to face,
    And met thy cruel eye and cloudy brow;
    But thy soul-withering glance I fear not now—
    For dread to prouder feelings doth give place
    Of deep abhorrence! Scorning the disgrace
    Of slavish knees that at thy footstool bow,
    I also kneel; but with far other vow
    Do hail thee and thy herd of hirelings base;—
    I swear, while life-blood warms my throbbing veins,
    Still to oppose and thwart, with heart and hand,
    Thy brutalizing sway—till Afric's chains
    Are burst, and Freedom rules the rescued land—
    Trampling Oppression and his iron rod:
    Such is the vow I take: SO HELP ME GOD!"
    ____________
    *The Liberator, Vol. 1, No. 1: Saturday, January 1, 1831.

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    This was the man in his sixth and twentieth year. His work and word, if not his name, was The Liberator. And to the end this was his motto: "My country is the world; my countrymen are all mankind."

    Of the philosophy and method of Mr. Garrison as the acknowledged leader of the anti-slavery movement, a few words cannot here be out of place. In scripture phrase it might be sufficient to say, "the weapons of his warfare were not carnal." He was ever pre-eminently a man of peace. At this time he was a devout believer in the truest, best interpretation of the New Testament, especially of the Sermon on the Mount and the story of the Good Samaritan.

    He held his mission to be a completion of the work begun in the Revolutionary War; but in magnitude, sublimity and solemnity, as well as in probable results on the destiny of the world, as far transcending that, as moral truth and right transcend physical force. All war, he held to be inherently, intrinsically wrong. And so he early declared all carnal weapons, even for deliverance from bondage, contrary to the spirit of Christ as well as of His teachings; and even counselled the slaves earnestly against any resort to them in achieving their liberty. And the Constitution of the American Anti-Slavery Society, work of his hand, contained such a provision.

    In a "Declaration of Principles adopted by a convention assembled in Philadelphia to organize a national anti-slavery association," are words like these from the same brain, heart and hand:

    "The right to enjoy liberty is inalienable; to invade it is to usurp the prerogative of Jehovah. Every man has a right to his own body, to the products of his labor, to the protection of law, and to the common advantages of society. It is piracy by our laws to buy or steal a native African and subject him to servi-

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    tude: surely the sin is as great to enslave an American. Every American citizen who detains a human being in involuntary bondage is (according to Exodus 21:16 [and Deuteronomy 24:7],) a man stealer. The slaves ought instantly to be set free, and brought under the protection of law."

    After much more in similar strain, follows this:

    "These are our views and principles—these our designs and measures. With entire confidence in the over-ruling justice of God, we plant ourselves upon the Declaration of our Independence and the truths of Divine Revelation as upon the Everlasting Rock. We shall send forth agents to lift up everywhere the voice of remonstrance, of warning, of entreaty and of rebuke.

    "We shall circulate unsparingly and extensively, anti-slavery tracts and periodicals.

    "We shall enlist the pulpit and the press in the cause of the suffering and the dumb.

    "We shall aim at a purification of the churches from all participation in the guilt of slavery.

    "We shall spare no exertions nor means to bring the whole nation to speedy repentance.

    "Our trust for victory is solely in God. We may be personally defeated, but our principles, never! Truth, Justice, reason, humanity, must and will gloriously triumph!

    In youth, Garrison had been a pronounced politician of the conservative party, as were most of the leading men of his native town. It was the sound of the Greek revolution against Turkish despotism which first filled his ear, and fired his young soul with the spirit of freedom. The powerful appeals of Daniel Weebster and Henry Clay in the American Senate fed the flame. Webster became to him the divinity of the forum. He even contemplated at one time a brief term at the West Point military school that he might take the field in person in the cause of the struggling Greeks. John Randolph had not yet told him and Webster and Clay that "the Greeks were at their own doors."

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    But as Mr. Garrison increased in wisdom and spiritual stature, and it became evident that he was to be the divinely constituted leader in the sublimest movement in behalf of liberty and humanity of many generations, his vision was so anointed that he saw clearly that, though he was indeed to wrestle with principalities and powers, and with spiritual wickedness in high places also, his weapons were to be drawn from no earthly magazines. The sword of the spirit of Truth only, was to be made mighty in his hands, to an extent such as had not been beheld before, from the day when an apostate Christianity in the person of Constantine the Great, mounted the throne of the Cæsars and most ingloriously proclaimed herself mistress of the world!

    When the American Anti-Slavery Society was formed in Philadelphia, in 1833, Garrison was a New Testament Christian, as he understood the word, in all the word can rightly be made to mean. And most of all, did he reverence the doctrines of freedom and peace. Peace on earth, liberty and good-will to men, to all men, and all women, were then his proclamation and song. Human life he came to regard as sacred above all other things. And so capital punishment and war, as well as slavery, were to him an abhorrence. Hence, logically, he renounced all allegiance to human governments founded in military force, and openly proclaimed himself disciple of the Prince of Peace, in these memorable words:

    "O Jesus! noblest of patriots, greatest of heroes, most glorious of martyrs! Thine is the spirit of universal liberty and love, of uncompromising hostility to every form of injustice and wrong. But not with weapons of death dost thou assail thy enemies, that they may be vanquished or destroyed. For thou dost not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against prin-

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    cipalities and powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places. Therefore hast thou put on the whole armor of God; having thy loins girt about with truth, and having on the breast-plate of righteousness, and thy feet shod with the preparation of the gospel of peace; going forth to battle with the shield of faith, the helmet of salvation, the sword of the spirit! [Eph. 6:12-17]

    "Worthy of all imitation art thou, in overcoming the evil that is in the world. For, by the shedding of thy own blood, but not the blood of thy bitterest foes even, shalt thou at last obtain a universal victory."

    "The Christian's victory alone
    Hostility forever ends;
    Erects an undisputed throne
    And turns his foes to friends.

    Ye great, ye mighty of the earth!
    Ye conquerers, learn this secret true!
    A secret of celestial birth—
    By suffering to subdue!"

    —LETTER TO KOSSUTH.

    The New England Non-Resistance Society was organized in 1838, and Mr. Garrison was elected corresponding secretary and member of the executive committee; and many of its first official papers and records, besides breathing his spirit, bear unmistakable imprint of his brain and hand. A portion of the preamble to its constitution reads thus:

    Whereas, The penal code of the first covenant has been abrogated by Jesus Christ, and whereas our Savior has left man example that we should follow his steps in forbearance, submission to injury and non-resistance, even when life itself is at stake; and whereas the weapons of a true Christian are not carnal but spiritual, and therefore mighty through God to the pulling down of strongholds; and whereas we profess to belong to a kingdom not of this world, which is without local or geographical boundaries, in which there is no division of caste, nor inequality of sex; therefore, we, the undersigned, etc., etc.

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    A part of Article II of the constitution reads:

    "The members of this society agree in the opinion that no man nor body of men, however constituted or by whatever name called, have right to take the life of man as penalty for transgression; that no one who professes to have the spirit of Christ can consistently sue a man at law for redress of injuries, or thrust any evil-doer into prison; or hold any office in which he would come under obligation to execute any penal enactments, or take any part in the military service; or acknowledge allegiance to any human government. * * *"

    At this time it cannot be doubted that the belief of Mr. Garrison in both the inspiration and authority of the Bible, the Trinity and Atonement, but especially in all the teachings and precepts of Christ, was almost precisely such as was then, and still is professed, by the whole Evangelical church. Among his many devout poetical effusions this will be found:

    SONNET TO THE BIBLE.

    "O Book of books! Though skepticism flout
    Thy sacred origin, thy worth decry;
    Though transcendental folly give the lie
    To what thou teachest: though the critic doubt
    This fact; that miracle; and raise a shout
    Of triumph o'er each incongruity
    He in thy pages may perchance espy;
    As in his strength, the effulgent sun shines out,
    Hiding innumerous stars, so dost thou shine,
    With heavenly light all human works excelling.
    Thy oracles are holy and divine,
    Of free salvation through a Savior telling.
    All truth, all excellence dost thou enshrine,
    The mists of sin and ignorance expelling."

    Such was Mr. Garrison as a Christian, as a follower of the Christ of the New Testament. And wondrously consistent with his faith were his spirit, his life, and his whole character.

    At home or abroad; in private or in public; as writer or as speaker; as husband, father, friend,

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    neighbor, or in whatever relation; after long, wide, and intimate acquaintance with men in pulpit, church, politics, and the world at large; for the constant exercise of what we call the Christian virtues and graces, I surely have seen few the peer, none the superior of William Lloyd Garrison.

    And yet he was called an infidel by almost all the universal church of the nation, from the university and theological seminary down to the humblest village pastors, churches, and Sunday-schools. With a life pure and spotless as the white plumage of angels, his whole character and conduct unsullied by the slightest breath of reproach, blessing many temporally and spiritually with whom he had intercourse, gentle and patient with ignorance, forbearing and long-suffering with prejudice and perverseness, and yet bold and brave, unconcealing and uncompromising where oppression and iniquity, injustice and cruelty were to be exposed and rebuked, no matter in what high places entrenched—yet was he branded, blasted as infidel, even atheist, when those words were made to stand for, were presumed to stand for all that is to be dreaded, shunned, execrated and exterminated at whatever cost!

    Revering the New Testament as law divine, he studied and respected its teachings. Did he read "Resist Not Evil?" He observed the sacred requirement, preached it in his journal, The Liberator, and practiced it everywhere. Hence arose the Non-Resistance Society, as well as a great national anti-slavery movement, which, without proscription, rested substantially and was largely sustained on a similar foundation.

    With him "love your enemies" never meant shoot them in war, nor hang nor imprison them in peace.

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    And so The Liberator, which was his own property from first to last, was not only a proclamation of peace, liberty and love on earth, but of general, universal unfolding, progressing and perfecting to all man and womankind.

    But, joining himself to no religious sect nor party, chained down to no narrow, dogmatic ringbolt, he had ever eye and ear, as well as heart and hospitality, for whatever new truth might appear—in whatever book, science or religion it might be found. And what wonder if years of violent opposition and persecution from almost the whole American church and clergy on account of his fidelity to the Christian doctrines of peace, purity and liberty as they were taught in the sermon on the mount, and the unswerving example of its great Author, should have clarified and quickened his vision mentally and spiritually! At any rate, he subsequently re-examined the faiths and formulas of the professedly evangelical sects in religion, including their avowed belief in plenary inspiration of Holy Scripture.

    As one result of his farther investigations, he attended a convention at Hartford, Connecticut, in 1853, called especially to consider the claim and character of the Jewish and Christian Scriptures. The meeting was very large, having representatives, men and women, from east and west, continuing four days, with three long sessions each. In one of them Mr. Garrison offered and ably defended a series of resolutions, the first of which was to this purport:

    "Resolved, That the doctrines of the American church and priesthood, that the Bible is the word of God; that whatever it contains was given by divine inspiration, and that it is the only rule of faith and practice, is self-evidently absurd; is exceedingly injurious both to the intellect and the soul; is highly per-

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    nicious in its application, and a stumbling block in the way of human redemption."

    And yet, to the end of life, no man more venerated or made wiser use of the Bible than did Mr. Garrison. A late testimonial of his reads thus:

    "I have lost my traditional and educational notions of the holiness of the Bible, but I have gained greatly, I think, in my estimation of it. * * * I am fully aware how grievously the priesthood have perverted it and wielded it as an instrument of spiritual despotism and in opposition to the sacred cause of humanity; still to no other volume do I turn with so much interest; no other do I consult or turn to so frequently; to no other am I so indebted for light and strength; no other is so identified with the growth of human freedom and progress. To no other have I appealed so effectively in aid of the various reformatory movements which I have espoused. And it embodies an amount of excellence so great as to make it, in my estimation, THE BOOK OF BOOKS."

    Garrison early learned to doubt nothing only because it was new, and he accepted nothing unless he saw on it more than the mold and moss of age and time. He found the world, even its most enlightened people, dead in the trespasses and sins of intemperance, slavery, war, capital punishment, and woman's enslavement. He lived to set on foot, or largely and liberally co-operate in enterprises and instrumentalities for correcting all these abuses, for righting all these fearful wrongs.

    But at last there came another stranger to his door. With characteristic hospitality that door was again opened. Francis Jackson, one of the noblest, bravest, most steadfast supporters of Mr. Garrison and his life work, once said with respect to sheltering and protecting the fugitive slave:

    "When I unfeelingly shut my door against a hunted, fleeing slave, may the God of compassion close the door of his mercy against me!"

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    So no slave, nor even stranger, ever appealed in vain to Garrison. The new guest was Spiritualism. That was a "sect everywhere spoken against" as fast as it grew in numbers—as anti-slavery had been in the generation preceding it. Even many of the best abolitionists, men and women who had bravely suffered persecution for and with the slave, treated it with contempt and scorn. Not so, never so, with Mr. Garrison. Many of his truest friends, some of them Quakers, as well as of other religious denominations, became early and devoted spiritualists, and that alone would have forever prevented him from dismissing, still less condemning, any stranger or defendant uncondemned, or even unheard.

    And in finally giving the new and mysterious idea recognition, he found, and to the end of his life believed, that he had literally entertained angels, and angels not unawares.

    Nor did he hesitate to make proclamation of the new and sublime Evangel. In The Liberator of March 3d, 1854, is an article from his pen, of which the following are but the opening paragraphs, giving a detailed account of a highly demonstrative seance he had just attended in New York, where writing, rapping, drumming, "drumming in admirable time and most spiritual manner," and other wondrous phenomena were witnessed. He wrote:

    We are often privately asked what we think of the "spiritual manifestations," so called, and whether we have had any opportunities to investigate them.

    "When we first heard of the "Rochester knockings" we supposed (not personally knowing the persons implicated) that there might be some collusion in that particular case, or if not, that the phenomena would, ere long, elicit a satisfactory solution, independent of any spiritual agency. As the manifestations

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    have spread from house to house, from city to city, from one part of the country to the other, across the Atlantic into Europe, till now the civilized world is compelled to acknowledge their reality, however diverse in accounting for them; as these manifestations continue to increase in variety and power, so that all suspicion of trick or imposture becomes simply absurd and preposterous; and as every attempt to find a solution for them in some physical theory relating to electricity, the odic force, clairvoyance, and the like, has thus far proved abortive—it becomes every intelligent mind to enter into an investigation of them with candor and fairness, as opportunity may offer, and to bear such testimony in regard to them as the facts may warrant: no matter what ridicule it may excite on the part of the uninformed or sceptical.

    "As for ourselves, most assuredly we have been in no haste to jump to a conclusion in regard to phenomena so universally diffused, and of so extraordinary a character. For the last three years, we have kept pace with nearly all that has been published on the subject; and we have witnessed, at various times, many surprising "manifestations;" and our conviction is that they cannot be accounted for on any other theory than that of spiritual agency. This theory, however is not unattended with discrepancies, difficulties, and trials. It is certain that, if it be true, there are many deceptive spirits, and that the apostolic injunction to "believe not every spirit," but to try them in every possible way, is specially to be regarded, or the consequences may prove very disastrous. We might write a long essay on what we have seen and heard touching the matter, but this we reserve for some other occasion.

    At the burial of his friend Henry C. Wright, who died on the 16th of August, 1870, he made one of the most eloquent and impressive addresses of his whole life. Mr. Wright had been for several years a pronounced and active spiritualist, and this is the

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    tribute, or a portion of it, which Mr. Garrison paid to that part of his life work:

    "I see it reproachfully stated in one newspaper at least, that he was a spiritualist. What if he was? That is simply a question of evidence. What has been possible in any age of the world as to spiritual phenomena, is possible in ours. And if we cannot believe what transpires in our days, before our own eyes, we certainly do not and cannot believe what is merely reported to have taken place ages ago.

    "What shall be said of the intelligence or sincerity of those who say they implicitly accept all the marvels and miracles recorded as having taken place thousands of years ago, with not a living witness to attest to any one of them; while they scout as arrant imposture perfectly analogous wonders and revelations, though these are confirmed by multitudes of living witnesses whose faithfulness cannot be questioned, and whose critical judgment and profound caution refute every imputation of folly or ignorance."

    When spiritualism was on trial at the bar of the judgment of this world, some of Mr. Garrison's friends saw with deep regret his hospitality and charity towards it. There were those who even denied positively that he was, or was in any danger of becoming, a spiritualist. So doutbtless his early political and religious associates felt and reasoned, when they saw his heart warmed, and his hand and voice were lifted in behalf of the imbruted slave and his few devoted, but despised and persecuted friends. With his shining talents and deep devotion to his then sincerely cherished political and religious principles, both of respectable and popular character, how could he ever become an Abolitionist?

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    But there's a Divinity that shapes our ends; and Garrison was a young man when he wrote:

    "I am an Abolitionist,
        Oppression's deadly foe;
    In God's great name will I resist
        And lay the monster low.
    In God's great name do I demand
        To all be Freedom given,
    That peace and joy may fill the earth
        And songs go up to heaven."

    And spiritualism he yoked to his chariot of salvation so soon as he espoused it in its fullness and conscious truth, as had already his friend Henry C. Wright, a few years before, and doubtless in the full faith and hope of Lord Brougham, when he wrote: "Even in the most cloudless skies of Skepticism, I see a rain-cloud, if it be no bigger than a man's hand, and its name is Spiritualism."

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    CHAPTER II.

    NATHANIEL PEABODY ROGERS

    When some discerning Romans saw how many statues were reared in their city to persons of only indifferent merit, while Cato, one of their wisest and best, had none, they wondered. But the great man had answered the question beforehand: "Better that posterity should ask why Cato has not a monument, than why he has."

    In the cemeteries of Concord, New Hampshire, are many memorial stones. Some of great beauty and cost, with proportionally elaborate and, perhaps, appropriate inscriptions. But situated among them is one lot of the ordinary family size, protected by no iron railing, no granite embankment, and whose dead level surface would seem never to have been invaded for burial, agricultural or any other human purpose.

    And yet to that hallowed spot I have conducted many devout pilgrims from east and west, both women and men. For there, since Sunday, the 18th day of October, 1846, exactly thirty-six years ago this very [1882] day, and almost hour, have slumbered the mortal remains of Nathaniel Peabody Rogers, surely one of the brightest, noblest, truest and every way most gifted sons, not only of the Granite state, but of any state of this union of states, departing at the early age of only fifty-two years.

    And no visitor from near or remote, ever fails to ask, sometimes with almost stunning emphasis: "Why has Rogers no monument?"

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    Should that sacred spot speak out from its silence of six and thirty years, doubtless its answer to the eminently pertinent inquiry would be, as was that of Cato, so well remembered, so much admired, so often repeated now, after more than two thousand years.

    Such as was Rogers, never die. They need no monuments reared by other hands than their own. Time mows down all marble and granite, tramples out all inscriptions in bronze or brass. And so such registers are soon lost for evermore.

    Sen. Charles Sumner It has been said of the immortal Senator [Charles] Sumner [1811-1874] and his humble tombstone at Mount Auburn, and lowly indeed it is:

    "The grass may grow o'er the lowly bed
    Where the noblest Roman hath laid his head;
    But mind and thought a nation's mind
    Embalm the lover of mankind."

    Ed. Note:
    Speeches by Sen. Sumner, A.B. 1830, LL.B. 1834, LL.D. 1859
    "Freedom National, Slavery Sectional," Congressional Globe, 32th Cong, 1st Sess, App, 1102-1114 (26 Aug 1852)
    "The Landmark of Freedom," Congressional Globe, 33d Cong, 2d Sess (21 Feb 1854)
    "The Crime Against Kansas," Cong Globe, 34th Cong, 2d Sess, 19-20 May 1856; and Works, vol. IV (Boston: Lee and Shepard, 1870-1873), pages 125-249
    "The Barbarism of Slavery," Congressional Globe, 36th Cong, 1st Sess 2590-2603 (4 June 1860)

    And scarcely of any man departed or still visible to mortal sight, could this be sung more appropriately than of the subject of this chapter {Nathaniel P. Rogers]; and for some seven years editor of the Herald of Freedom, published in Concord, New Hampshire, ten or twelve years.

    Ed. Note: Rogers was an early writer on the unconstitutionality of slavery, as early as January 1837, an example thereafter followed by Smith (1840), Mellen (1841), Spooner (1845), Shaw (1846), James (1849), Tiffany (1849), Goodell (1852), Lincoln (1854), Douglass (1860), as per list cited infra, p 75).

    Mr. Rogers was born at Plymouth, on the 3d of June, 1794, and was one of the tenth generation from him who is so well, widely and honorably known as "Rev. John Rogers," the first in that blessed company of martyrs who suffered in the reign of the bigoted and bloody [English Queen] Mary, in the year 1555.

    And surely the blood of the martyr, literally and spiritually, flowed in the veins of his remote descendant, answering "heart to heart," as well as "face to face."

    For those who have been privileged to see both our departed editor in the flesh and form, and a singularly well preserved portrait of the martyr in the American Antiquarian Society hall at Worcester, Massachusetts, have wondered at the remarkable resemblance in the


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    shape of head and face, in complexion, color of eye and hair, and the whole general expression of the two memorable men.

    He graduated with honors at Dartmouth college, in the year 1816. He studied law with the distinguished Richard Fletcher, and then settled down to its practice in his native town, marrying a daughter of Hon. Daniel Farrand, of Burlington, Vermont. He conducted a flourishing and successful law practice in Plymouth for about twenty years before moving to Concord to take charge of the Herald of Freedom.

    As student in general literature, especially in history and poetry, none of his day were before him. Few ever heard Shakespeare, Scott, Byron and Burns read more beautifully, more thrillingly, than at his fireside, surrounded by his estimable wife and seven children, with sometimes a few invited friends. But general reading and home delights never detracted from the duties of his profession. When he died, an intimate friend, who had known him long and well, wrote that so accurate was his knowledge of law, and so industrious was he in business, that the success of a client was always confidently expected from the moment his assistance was secured. His life mission, however, was neither literature nor law. He was in due time ordained, consecrated as a high priest in the great fellowship of humanity, and wondrously, divinely did he magnify his office in the ten or twelve last years of his earthly life.

    In the year 1835, he made acquaintance with Garrison, and soon placed himself at his side as the hated, hunted, persecuted champion of the American slave, as by this time Garrison was known to be. And from that time, too, Rogers was ever found the firm, unshaken, uncompromising friend and advocate of not

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    only the anti-slavery enterprise, but of the causes of temperance, peace, rights of woman, abolition of the gallows and halter, and other social and moral reforms.

    Here may be the place to say what certainly should be said at some time and place, a few words on the early religious character of Mr. Rogers. For it is neither known to this generation nor presumed what manner of men and women were most of those who early espoused the cause of the American slave; especially in their relations to the popular and prevailing religion of their time. Both Mr. and Mrs. Rogers were active and honored members in the Congregational church at Plymouth, when they espoused the cause of the slave. And they naturally looked, as did other anti-slavery Christians, to the church and pulpit as the divinely appointed instrumentality for emancipating the bondmen, especially of their own country, enslaved, too, by laws of their own enactment and religious sanction and approval.

    Perhaps a few excerpts from an early editorial in the Herald of Freedom will illustrate the quality of the religious sentiment and opinion of the editor, as well as the tone and temper of his heart and spirit. The whole article is in the Herald of August 11, 1838, and is a review of a contribution to the Christian Examiner, entitled "The Presence of God." The Examiner was a Unitarian journal, the sect at that time quite alien to the more evangelical views of Mr. Rogers:

    "We wander a moment from our technical anti-slavery sphere, to say, with permission of our readers, a word or two on a beautiful article in the Christian Examiner. It is from the pen of one of our gifted fellow citizens, to whom the unhappy subjects of insanity in this state owe so much for the public charity now contemplated in their behalf. It is written with great eloquence, perspicuity and force of

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    style; and what is more, it seems scarcely to want that spirit of heart-broken Christianity so apt to be missing in the peaceful speculation of reviews, and may we not say in the speculations of the elegant corps among whom the writer of the article is here found. We will find briefly what fault we can with the article.

    "Its beauties need not be pointed out. They lie scattered profusely over its face. It is an article on "The Presence of God," and treats of our relations to Him. But does it set forth that relation as involving our need of the Lord Jesus Christ, in order that we may be able to stand in it?

    "For ourselves we cannot contemplate God, and dare not look towards Him unconnected with Christ. Our writer seems boldly to look upon Him as the strong-eyed eagle gazes into the sun. God is of purer eyes than to behold iniquity. He cannot look upon sin but with abhorrence. We have sinned; therefore we fear to behold him. In Christ alone is He our Father in heaven, and we His reconciled children. In Christ we dare take hold of His hand, and of the skirts of His almighty garments. The Lord Jesus Christ and Him crucified is the medium through whom alone we dare look upon God, in His works, His providence, or His grace. Sinless man might, without this medium. Fallen man may not. * * *

    "The writer contemplated God in His works—but he seems, though awed, elevated and delighted at their grandeur, beauty and wisdom, to feel still baffled of the great end in their contemplation. Does he not, we would ask him, feel the absence of some link in the chain of communication with this ineffable being, which might, if not interrupted, anchor his soul securely within the veil, which after all continues to shroud him from communion and sight? Can he, in sight of the works of God, speak out and sing in the strains of the Singer of Israel? * * *

    "The writer speaks of the communion of God with our minds. This he seems to regard with chief interest. He speaks of "the need of having attention," meaning intellectual attention, "waked up to these old truths." "Listlessness of mind," he continues, "an inveterate habit of inattention to the exis-

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    tence of the Eternal Spirit, needs to be broken in upon. We need to help each other to escape a fatuity of mind on this subject that we may feel that God's ark still rides o'er the world's waves, and that the burning bush has not gone out."

    "There is an "inattention," it is true, but it is of the heart, not merely of the mind, of the nature and not of "habit" merely; a spiritual inattention, or rather alienation from God, which must be broken in upon. It is not the creature of habit. Adam felt it in all its force on the very day of his first transgression. He heard the voice of God, which, in his innocency, he had hailed with joy, beyond all he felt at the beauties of Paradise; heard it walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and he hid himself from the presence of the Lord God among the trees of the garden.

    "His wife also hid herself, for she, too, had transgressed, and we, their moral heirs, hide ourselves so to this day. They could walk in the garden in sight of the beautiful works of God, perhaps admire the splendors of Eden, but when they heard His voice, they hid themselves.

    "Not from habit surely, that not being the creature of a day. There was "inveteracy," not of habit, but of fallen nature. It is that which must be "broken in upon" before we shall incline to come out from among the trees to welcome the presence of God.

    "It may be there is a figurative meaning in this hiding among the trees from the presence of Him who made those trees. And may we not deceive ourselves in supposing we contemplate God in His works, when, in truth, we are seeking to hide ourselves from His presence among the glorious trees of this earth's garden? * * *

    "We have revolted from God. We are born universally in a state of alienation from Him. The Scriptures and all experience teach this. We do not more certainly inherit the transmitted form of our fallen first-parents, than their descended nature. We are born with the need of being "born again." Of this we are sure. We cannot evade it. It is our fate in the wisdom of God. We cannot escape it any more than the Old World could the deluge. * * *

    "We have an ark of safety, to be sure, capacious enough to save

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    the entire race of man. It will save only those who will enter it. And the time of entering, as it was at the flood, is before the sky of probation is overcast. The door is that now, as then, before the falling of the first great drops of the eternal thunder shower.

    "The ark of safety, we need not say, is Christ. He is the Way, the Truth and the Life. No man can come to the Father but by Him. Whoever hath seen Him hath seen the Father. And by Him is the only manifestation of the presence of God. The presence of His power may be seen in all objects around us. But His strong love to the children of men, cannot be seen but through Christ. * * *

    "But we are forgetting that our Herald is a small sheet. We have not space to notice the exquisite beauties of our writer's production as a composition merely; or the argument it draws of God's presence from his works; and as it purports to notice merely this evidence of his presence, we will not here express our regret that the name of Christ is not mentioned in the article. May the gifted writer if he be out of the ark of safety, not delay to enter in. Let him not tarry without to gaze with the eye of elegant curiosity on the scenery of this Sodom world—but bow his neck, "and enter while there's room." And as we bespeak his immediate heed to "the one thing needful," so we demand his pen, voice, influence, prayer and action and open cooperation in the deliverance of his fellow countrymen from the CHAIN OF SLAVERY."

    Thus loyal was the editor of the Herald to the religious doctrine and teaching of his time in the church of his choice. The church of his fathers through nine generations. Thus diligently had he studied and considered them; and thus eloquently and faithfully, though tenderly and affectionately, did he present, recommend and enforce them, whenever and wherever he had opportunity.

    In 1838 he removed from Plymouth to Concord, and became sole editor of the Herald of Freedom,

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    He had, from its establishment in 1834, furnished many most brilliant and trenchant articles for its columns. To the readers of the paper, now alas! the most of them, with its editor, no more, nothing need be said of his power with his pen. Only a single duodecimo volume of three hundred and eighty pages of his editorial writings has been reprinted and preserved, and that long ago disappeared from the market. Ten dollars, it is said, have been offered for a single copy; though that perhaps might have been before most of the early readers had passed away. Some of its descriptive articles have been pronounced as unsurpassed in life and vigor, brilliancy and beauty, as were their rebukes of slave holders and their abettors and accomplices, scathing, withering, but always eminently just.

    His "Jaunt to the White Mountains" with Garrison in the year 1841, was copied from the Herald columns into a neat tract and was a capital contribution to the tourist literature of that period. Its length precludes possibility of insertion here; but one of less volume and of scarcely less power entitled "Ailsa Craig," may not so reasonably be rejected. For the world never knew the sublimely gifted writer as it should have known him, and doubtless would, but for his too early removal to higher spheres. Young readers will surely pardon a page or two when they have read them, introduced here for their profit as well as pleasure, showing not only the power of the writer, but also giving them a description of one of the most remarkable as well as interesting spots in the British realm. It is from the Herald of Freedom of April 30, 1841:

    AILSA CRAIG.
    This famous rock in the Irish Sea, we meant to have said something about when we saw it, long

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    before this time. But anti-slavery makes us omit and forget the wonders of the Old World. We passed it on a trip from Scotland to Ireland. We left Glasgow on the twenty-eighth of July, 1840, at ten in the morning, for Dublin. William Lloyd Garrison in company, our fellow passenger to the Irish Capital. * * *

    "We went on board a steamer and rode down the ship-thronged Clyde. Nothing can exceed its beauty below the great city of Glasgow. To be sure, they have robbed it of its native banks,-and commerce has substituted for the green slope, a sloping wall of neat and firm stone masonry on each side, and straightened its once indented shores. But the utility of the metamorphosis is so mighty, and so palpable, making this narrow stream, far away inland, the highway for the commerce of one of the great ports of Britain; of a city as large as New York or Liverpool, where the largest ships may ride as freely as in the ocean for depth of water, that it gives it a most imposing, singular, and interesting appearance. It is hardly broader than some of the widest streets of London.

    "Our little steamer elbowed its way among the keels that thronged it like "the full tide of human existence," along the slippery pavements and broad side-walks of Cheapside, or Glasgow's Broadway, the swarming Irongate. It was amusing to see the ploughed up water roll along the stone banks, half way up their slopes, in waves that coiled and convolved like the folds of the sea serpent. The walls were a good deal higher than the natural shores, which were wet and low. They had filled in behind them with earth, and made high, wide and level land on either side which was now covered with old verdure, and planted with stately trees:-and the promenader might take his rural walk there, side by side with the winged commerce of every quarter of the globe:-the "white sail gliding by the tree," and the smoky plumage of the steamers streaming off over among the glorious woodlands.

    "We made our way steadily, though not rapidly down the widening channel, and came to where the "bonnie" Vale of Leven, came upon the Clyde from Loch Lomond and its

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    enclosing mountains which we could descry in the misty distance, up the Vale.

    "All abolitionists have heard of the Vale of Leven, and remember its Remonstrance to the Women of America, sent over here some four years ago, and unfurled over the heads of thousands in Broadway Tabernacle at an anti-slavery anniversary. The four thousand Scottish women who signed it, dwelt in the Vale of Leven. We saw John Summerville, the minister who obtained their signatures. What would induce one of our clergy, with any "weight of influence" to be seen going about for women's signatures to an abolition petition? Where Leven Vale meets the Clyde rises a tremendous rock, in the clefts of which lodges the grim old fortress of Dumbarton Castle, famous in the history of Sir William Wallace.

    "The river soon broadened into a frith, as the Scotch call their bays. The mountains retreated from each other, and sails were to be seen here and there at anchor in the coves and harbors of the wide waters near their bases. We met a naval horse race on the frith of eight beautiful little vessels at the very top of their speed. They were running the heats, in a wide circle, and leaning down hard to the sea close on each other's heels; all sail crowded they made the water foam white about their prows. It was quite an animating sight, with none of the painful sensations at seeing poor quadruped horses scourged and pressed beyond their powers. There was no distress, nor faltering of wind, in these graceful little racers, as they swept the frith of Clyde.

    "A Mr. McTear had come aboard the steamer at Greenock for Dublin. He was a Greenock merchant. We were talking with him on the deck when we spied a conical rock, as it seemed, rising out of the water some distance ahead. It appeared through the thin mists like a hay stack, and about as large. We spoke of it to Mr. McTear, and he told us it was Ailsa Craig. We remembered mention of it by [Scottish poet Sir Walter] Scott [1771-1832], in the "Lord of the Isles," where he calls it rock instead of craig, in the mouth of Robert Bruce [1274-1329; King of Scotland, 1306-1329]:

    "Lord of the Isles, my trust in thee
    Is firm as Ailsa rock!"

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    "We had supposed it was in the Forth on the other side of Scotland. As we were looking at it, Mr. McTear asked us to guess the distance to it. Strangers he said, were apt to greatly mistake the distance. We looked at the rock along the intervening water. We could get no aid from the shores which were at great distance, quite out of sight on one hand. We supposed of course, we should underrate the distance. So we stretched it liberally, as we thought, and guessed two miles, though it did not look like that distance.

    "You have made the common mistake, he said; it is over twenty. We could hardly credit it; but he told us we should see it was so, for we would be over two hours getting to it and were going at ten knots. And over two hours it was; and such was the deceptive character of the way, that when we thought we were coming right upon it, and wanting our friend Garrison, who was asleep below, to see it, we went down and told him to hurry up and see "Ailsa Rock." It proved, to the amazement of us both, that we were then nearly ten miles from it. And the little prominence, that looked so like a hay stack, or a hay cock, when we descried it first, grew as we neared it, a mighty mountain, nine hundred and eighty feet high, rising abruptly out of the sea, and two miles about the base.

    "He had been himself governor of the Craig some years before, and had great sport and some danger in killing the birds. His way of killing them was with a club, and he told us how many thousands, we dare not say how many he had killed in a single day of a famous kind of goose. He had let himself down to a quarter of the cliffs where they hunted to get the young and eggs, and the old ones attacked him and he fought them with his club till he was covered with blood, theirs and his own.

    "He had a good mind, he said, to give them one gun, just to let us see them fly, as we were strangers. As he had been the Marquis's governor, he said, he would venture that he would overlook it in him. He ordered his boy to bring the musket. The boy returned and said it was left behind at Glasgow.

    "Load up the swivel then," said

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    the captain. "It will be all the better. It will make quite a flight, ye'll find. Load her up pretty well." The steamer meanwhile kept nearing the giant craig, which was a bare rock from summit to sea, and all of a dull, chalky whiteness, occasioned, as the captain said, by the excrement of the birds. We saw caves in the sides of the mountain and down by the water; the retreats, our informant told us, in former times, of the smugglers who used to frequent the craig and carry on an extensive trade from these places of concealment. We had got so near as to see the white birds flitting across the entrances to the caverns like bees about the hive. With the spy-glass we could see them distinctly and in very considerable numbers; and at length approached so that we could see them on the ledges all over the sides of the mountain.

    "We had passed the skirt of the craig, and were within a half mile, or less, of its base. With the glass we could now see the entire mountain side peopled with the sea fowl, and could hear their whimpering, household cry as they moved about, or nestled in domestic snugness on the ten thousand ledges. The air, too, about the precipices, seemed to be alive with them. Still we had not the slightest conception of their frightful multitude. We got about the center of the mountain, when the swivel was fired. The shot went point blank against it and struck the stupendous precipice, as from top to bottom with a reverberation like the discharge of a hundred cannon.

    "And what a sight followed! They rose up from that mountain, the countless myriads and millions of sea birds, in a universal, overwhelming cloud that covered the whole heavens, and their cry was like the cry of an alarmed nation. Up they went, millions upon millions, ascending like the smoke of a furnace; countless as the sands on the sea shore; awful, dreadful for multitude, as if the whole mountain were dissolving into life and light, and with an unearthly kind of lament, took up their line of march in every direction off to sea.

    "The sight startled the people on board the steamer, who had often witnessed it before, and for some

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    minutes there ensued a general silence. For our own part, we were quite amazed and overawed at the spectacle. We had seen nothing like it before. We had seen White Mountain Notches and Niagara Falls in our own land, and the vastness of the wide and deep ocean, which was separating us from it. We had seen something of art's magnificence in the old world; its cloud-capped towers, gorgeous palaces and solemn temples, but we had never witnessed sublimity to be compared to that rising of sea-birds from Ailsa Craig. They were of countless varieties in kind and size, from the largest goose to the smallest marsh bird, and of every conceivable variety of dismal note. Off they moved in wild and alarmed route, like a people going into exile, filling the air far and wide, with their reproachful lament at the wanton cruelty that had broken them up and driven them into captivity.

    "We really felt remorse at it; and the thought might have occurred to us how easy it would have been for them, if they had known that the little, smoking speck that was laboring along the sea-surface beneath them had been the cause of their banishment, to have settled down upon it and engulfed it out of sight forever.

    "We felt astonished that we had never heard before of this wonderful haunt of sea-fowl, and that no one had ever written a book upon it. It struck us really as one of the wonders of the world. And not us alone. Others, not at all given to the marvellous, declared it surpassed everything they had ever before witnessed. We supposed the mountain must have been quite deserted from the myriads that had flown away; but lifting the glass to it, as we were leaving its border, we were appalled to find it still alive with the myriads that were left behind. They kept leaving and leaving until our steamer got far beyond the Craig, and till we could no longer discern their departure with the telescope.

    "And it was miles off into the dusky Irish Sea, before we saw the ebbing of their mighty movement, and that they were beginning to return. We felt relieved to see them going back. It had scarcely occurred to us in our surprise, that they were not

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    leaving their native cliffs forever. Slowly and sadly they seemed to return, while the eye sought in vain to ken the outskirts of their mighty caravan. And Ailsa Craig had sunk far into our rear, and quite sensibly diminished in the distance, before the rearmost of the feathered host had disappeared from our sight.

    "The excitement occasioned us considerable depression of spirits, from which we were not entirely relieved until night came down upon the St. George's Channel, and the protracted northern twilight could no longer disclose objects to our wearied vision. Then after refreshing ourselves with some substantial confectionery, with which dear George Thompson had kindly stuffed our pockets from a shop at Greenock, before leaving "the land of cakes," our beloved fellow-passenger and ourself, after sundry fond remembrances of the other side of the ocean, some expectations of next day's greeting in Dublin, and some grateful sense, as we trust, of the goodness that had not forgotten us amid all our dangers by sea and land, we forgot what we had seen, and whereabouts we were, in the arms of oblivious sleep."

    To do justice to the memory of Nathaniel Peabody Rogers, to his character and work, would require genius and inspiration like his own.

    Nor, perhaps, would this cheap age even then understand nor comprehend it.

      It manufactures sham and shoddy at too many of its mills, political, literary, social, moral and religious.

      It quotes Pope and Burns about an "honest man," but seems not to know him when he comes.

      It celebrated the birthday of [Scottish poet] Robert Burns [1759-1796] with much pomp and demonstration in less than one month after it hung [abolitionist] John Brown [1800-1859] for a heroism and devotion to freedom and humanity, which began, rekindled with divine fervor, where the zeal of LaFayette for a white man's liberty paled out of human sight.














      And socially, morally and religiously it [this "cheap age"] had hung Rogers long before, in the same

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    persecuting spirit that burned his illustrious ancestor [the first English Protestant martyr, Rev. John Rogers (1500-1555] in the [1555] Smithfield pyre [under English Queen Mary (1553-1558)].

    In the true spirit of martyrdom did Rogers, like John Brown, join the anti-slavery movement in an hour of peril. Garrison had been mobbed in Boston, as was said, "in broad day, by Boston's best men in broadcloth, gentlemen of property and standing"; driven from a female anti-slavery concert of prayer which he had been invited to attend and address. Mr. Garrison said of the spectacle when all the streets near the place of meeting were thronged with a mob burning with murderous intent:

    "It was an awful, sublime and soul-thrilling scene—enough, one would suppose, to melt adamantine hearts, and make even fiends of darkness stagger and retreat. Indeed the clear, untremulous voice of that Christian heroine, Miss Parker, in prayer occasionally awed the ruffians into silence, and she was heard distinctly, even in the midst of their hisses and yells and curses."
    Garrison withdrew from the prayer meeting and the mayor entered in obedience to the wishes of the fiendish crew, and dispersed it. Then the cry, the shriek, the yell was,
    "we must have Garrison." "Out with him! Lynch him!"
    Some of the rioters discovered and seized him. They drew him furiously to a window and were about to thrust him out, when one of them relented and said,
    "Let us not kill him out-right."
    But they coiled a rope about his body, nearly stripped him of his clothing, then dragged him through the streets till he was finally rescued by posse comitatus and at frightful peril was at length got to the mayor's office. There he was provided with clothing and from thence sent to jail, as "a disturber of the peace," the mayor and his advisers declaring that "the only way to preserve his life."

    In Alton

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    Rev. Elijah Parish Lovejoy, too, another anti-slavery editor, had been shot and killed by a mob, five bullets being taken from his body, three from his breast, and that, too, in 1837, only a few months before Mr. Rogers removed with his family to Concord to conduct the Herald of Freedom.

    Ed. Note: See also p 84. Harriet Beecher Stowe, Key (1853), p 228, provides more details on Rev. Lovejoy's murder, in reprisal for exercising First Amendment freedom-of-the-press rights.

    So that in assuming such position, he also, as might be said, "took his life in his hand." For Concord itself was no stranger to the mob at that time and for years afterward was the consecrated guardian of slavery.

    As a member of the Plymouth Congregational church, both Mr. and Mrs. Rogers had cooperated earnestly, faithfully in works of religious benevolence and charity. But when they demanded that those in bonds in their own country should be remembered even "as bound with them," they were repulsed as disorderly, contumacious disturbers of the peace of the church and its minister, who, at that time, was among the most virulent opposers of the whole anti-slavery enterprise.

    But they did not withdraw from their church connection till they saw that southern slaveholders were more welcome to the pulpit and sacramental table, than were faithful, devoted abolitionists, whose moral and religious integrity of character, as well as soundness of opinion, were above reproach or suspicion. Rogers, beyond most public men, ever had unshaken faith in the people, though conservative while a politician, and orthodox in his religious faith. When he left the church he investigated its character anew and for himself. The claims of the clergy to prerogative in things temporal as well as spiritual, he soon learned to hold in profound disesteem. To no one man then living, or who has appeared since, does the world owe more than to him for exposing and rebuking the

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    arrogance and insolence not to say down-right fraud and dishonesty, of a ministry whose ruling, directing power in all the great popular demonstrations of the land, north as well as south, was exerted in support and sanctification of slavery. The exceptions to this charge were too few to change the result, as will appear in the progress of this work.

    Mr. Rogers never doubted for a moment that the people, well and wisely taught, would abolish slavery and cease to oppress one another. And so like the Great Emancipator of Nazareth, he directed all his sternest strokes and rebukes at the priests and rulers, who really "bound the heavy burdens and laid them on men's shoulders [Matthew 23:4]," as in Judea, two thousand years ago. He and his associates of the Garrison school of abolitionists relied solely on the power of moral and spiritual truth to rescue the slave as well as to redeem and save the world.

    They formed, they joined no political party. They abjured the ballot altogether as a reforming or restoring agency, as much as they did the bullet, the only specie redemption of the ballot, in every government of force. Both Mr. and Mrs. Rogers were members and officers of the New England Non-Resistance Society. And none ever more highly adorned the doctrine of their profession than they.

    As one with vision anointed to perceive all moral and spiritual truth, Rogers seemed to stand almost alone. His editorial writings are witness to this, and will be to more than the next generation. It were well for man and womankind, if whole volumes of them, judiciously selected, could be reproduced and scattered everywhere, like the shining constellation among the dimmer stars. His words to-day are, many of them, wondrously fresh and new.

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    The temperance cause had no firmer or mure consistent friend. The peace societies had best of reasons to be proud of his support, in word and deed. To him human life was sacred as the life of God. Once, at a grand Peace gathering, it was strenuously argued by most of the members who spoke, that human life could and should be taken by divine command. And the president of the society himself made an argument in defence of all the slaughters of the Canaanites and other tribes and peoples, men, women and children, by Moses, Joshua and their destroying hosts, because perpetrated by command of God.

    It was at one of the last meetings Rogers ever attended, and he was then too feeble to bear an active part m the deliberations. But after listening a good while to scripture text and learned logic under Levitical law, he rose to his feet and in low voice asked: "Does our brother yonder say that if God commanded him, he would take a sword and use it in slaying human beings, and innocent, helpless human beings? "Yes, if God commanded," was the answer. "Well, I wouldn't," responded Rogers, and sank back into his seat, amid loud cheers of evident approval and admiration.

    Woman, to him, was in all rights, privileges and prerogatives, the full equal of man. He was a Christian in the divinest, sublimest sense of that still mysterious and much abused word. And as such his kingdom was not of this world. And so he could neither vote in, nor ask others to vote in nor to fight for any government based on military power.

    As husband and father, none ever knew one in whom his family were more supremely felicitated. As companion and friend, blessed and happy were all those who enjoyed his confidence and esteem. Gentle,

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    simple, tender, kind, ready to sacrifice his own comfort; sharing on occasion, like General Washington, his room and bed with a colored man, and yet always discriminating in high degree; with tastes most refined; ever ready to criticise, even censure a friend, however dear, when he deemed it just and demanded; firm as his own Ailsa Craig, whenever or wherever, or however a moral principal was in jeopardy; running over with music, poetry, and culture of every kind, he was a man, the like of whom the world has seldom seen—may not soon see again.

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    CHAPTER III.

    SLAVERY—AS IT WAS.

    Everybody now is anti-slavery. It is honorable now to be a child of the man who "cast the first anti-slavery vote in our town;" or called "our first anti-slavery meeting;" or first entertained Garrison as guest, or Abby Kelley, or Frederick Douglass; or rescued Stephen Foster or Lucy Stone from the hands of a ferocious mob; or raised, or commanded the first company of colored troops in the war of Rebellion, at the time when not a musical band could be found in the whole city of New York to play for a colored regiment, as it marched from the New Haven Railway station to the steamer at the foot of Canal street to embark for the seat of war!

    "Paid pipers" the venerable Dr. Tyng with withering scorn called them all on the same evening in Cooper Institute, where he presided at a lecture by George William Curtis. "Paid pipers," with wind too immaculate to blow away in escort of a gallant battalion of our country's saviors, "when there was no other name under heaven given among men," whereby the nationality could be saved but the negro name; despised as he was and rejected of men; "a man of sorrows" and acquainted all his dreary life with grief!

    Everybody now is [claims to be] an abolitionist, or son, or grandson of an anti-slavery parentage, and so all seem to claim equal honor, so far as honor is due, for ridding the world of the sublimest scourge and curse that ever afflicted the human race.

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    Few now, however, have much conception of what slavery was; or what was genuine, effective anti-slavery, when slavery sat supreme "on its throne of skulls," and ruled the whole nation, state, church and school, literature, trade, commerce, manufactures and agriculture, as with rod of iron!

    And its first command, great command, only command was, "Thou shalt have no god but me." Not, as from Mount Sinai, "no other gods before me," but no other god. Not "no other gods before me," but "no other gods with, or above or below me!" So it was. Anti-slavery then, was more than a name; more than profession; or denomination in religion; or party in the government.

    So Christianity had mighty meanings when the great apostle to the Gentiles wrote: "I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ." [Rom 1:16.] And "I determined to know nothing among you save Jesus Christ and him crucified." [I Cor. 2:2.] It had fearful meanings when the gardens of Nero were illumined with the burning bodies of martyred saints, both men and women, young and old! When to name the Christ of God was death in lingering torments—when crucifixions were so multiplied that, as in grim epigram it was said, "space was wanted for crosses, and crosses for christians." And yet so sublime was Christian heroism at that hour, that it could have well been added, but christians are never wanting for crosses.

    But what was our slave system, that so many now proudly claim to have aided to destroy? And whose fathers and mothers were those who really did bear active, effective part in the thirty years moral and peaceful conflict, inaugurated by Garrison with "sword of the spirit;" whose only weapons were

    "The mild arms of truth and love,
    Made mighty through the living God?"

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    Or whose sons and brothers rushed at last to the field of mortal combat, and fought the bloodiest, mightiest, everyway, most frightful war, that has shaken the earth and darkened the skies in all the Christian years? Slavery! What is it? What was it on the American plantation? "Peculiar Institution," some called it. "Patriarchal Institution," others!

    But what was it? All language pales and is silent in its dread presence. Slave-holding! "Deed without a name!" In cant phrase we said slavery degrades man to the brute, sinks woman to the dead level of the horse. And then who knows the height and depth, the length and breadth of those stunning words; insulting blasphemies against the Holy Spirit of Humanity!

    Let one advertisement, distributed by large handbills, as well as published in the daily newspapers of New Orleans, aid the imagination :

    RAFFLE. MR. JOSEPH JENNINGS respectfully informs his friends and the public that, at the request of many acquaintances, he has been induced to purchase from Mr. Osborne, of Missouri, the celebrated DARK BAY HORSE, "STAR," aged five years, square trotter and warranted sound, with a new, light Trotting Buggy and Harness; Also the dark, stout Mulatto Giri, "Sarah," aged about twenty years, general house servant, valued at nine hundred dollars, and guaranteed: and will be RAFFLED for at four o'clock P.M., February first, at the selection hotel of the subscribers. The above is as represented, and those persons who may wish to engage in the usual practice of raffling will, I assure them, be perfectly satisfied with their destiny in this affair.

    The whole is valued at its just worth, fifteen hundred dollars; fifteen hundred CHANCES at One Dollar each. The Raffle will be conducted by gentlemen selected by the interested subscribers present. Five nights will be allowed to complete the Raffle. Both of the above described can be seen at my store, No. 78 Common street, second door from Camp, at from nine o'clock A.M., to two P.M.

    Highest throw to take the first choice; the lowest throw the remaining prize, and the fortunate winners will pay Twenty Dollars each for the refreshments furnished on the occasion.

    N. B. No chances recognized unless paid for previous to the commencement.

    JOSEPH JENN1NGS.

    In the light of a spectacle like this, it is possible to fancy slightly what should be understood when it is said that slavery degrades human beings to the plane of brute beasts.

    Or reverse the order of illustration, if we dare, and imagine a brute beast raised to the dignity and honor,

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    the privilege and prerogative of a man, an immortal being. History or fable tells us of a Roman Sovereign who made a favorite horse first Consul of the Empire. Such mockery might have been. But suppose in a Christian country, in a Christian sanctuary, it were proposed to admit, not a horse, but some dogs into full fellowship and communion with the church. It is on a delightful Sunday of early summer, in a pleasant New England country town. The village gardens are already abloom with early flowers, the orchards are white with prophecy of abundant fruit, and every tree is an orchestra of cheerful birds, whose worship-notes almost charm the Sabbath silence into sweet accord with the songs of paradise.

    All the village and the districts around assemble at their, to them, "house of God." At the appointed hour, the baptized communicants of the accepted faith are invited to seats at the sacramental board. The unregenerate of the congregation retire to the outer seats, paying silent but respectful attention. The first scene in the solemn service is admission of new members, who are invited forward to the altar. There, in presence of the congregation, they listen and bow silent assent to the Articles of Faith and the Covenant Vows, and receive the seal of baptism, in the name of the triune God. Solemn and impressive as this may be, it may excite no unusual emotions, being neither new nor infrequent.

    But slavery, we used to say with lip only, "degrades man and woman to a level with the brutes;" puts the "bay horse, Star," and the "Mulatto girl, Sarah," into the same raffle, or on the same auction-block. Now change the order. Elevate the brutes to the place of immortal beings at the baptismal font and sacramental table. Whistle up two or three dogs and solemnly read over to them the creed and

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    covenant, and sprinkle them with the holy drops of baptism, calling them by their appropriate brute names, "Lion, I baptize thee in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Tiger, I baptize thee in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost." And let the third be a female: "Topsy, I baptize thee in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen."

    Let such a spectacle be enacted on a delightful summer Sunday afternoon, in a beautiful New England village, in its pleasant white meeting-house, and at the memorial supper of that crucified Redeemer in whom the church and its pastor devoutly believed, and through whom they humbly hoped for salvation. Can the effect on the beholders of such a daring spectacle be described, or even imagined? As well, but no better, attempt a description of that slavery which truly did degrade human beings to a level with horses and with dogs.

    This whole scene was once supposed as illustration, in the days of slavery, in just such town and house of worship as here described, and not only that town, but the pulpit and religious press of both the hemispheres almost shrieked as with holy horror at what they called so audacious, so diabolical blasphemy. And the cry came up from near and far for immediate punishment of him who had so illumined slavery, to the fullest demand of the statute, which was long confinement, it was held, in the State prison!

    But one thing was made clear. The words, Slavery degrades man to a level with beasts, were seen and felt as perhaps never before. The congregation where the illustration was presented saw and solemnly felt that from beasts up to men—to men exalted to angelic heights—was no farther than those deeps down which

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    immortal man is plunged, to reach the level of the beasts that perish. And that frightful pit was reached by every chattel slave ever born.

    But the question, What was American slavery? is not yet answered. To call it robbery, by only our dictionary definition, would pay it high compliment. Its fell [evil, atheist, demonized] work began where all ordinary robbery leaves off.

    John Wesley saw it [American slavery] and pronounced it, "Sum of all villainies."

    And if he did not pronounce the slave holder sum of all villains, he did address him in words like these:


    "What I have said to slave-traders, equally concerns all slave-holders, of whatever rank and degree, seeing man-buyers are exactly on a level with man-stealers. You say, I pay honestly for my goods, and am not concerned to know they are honestly come by.

    "Nay, but you are. * * * You know they are not honestly come by; you know they are procured by means nothing near so innocent as picking pockets, house-breaking, or robbery on the highway. You know they are procured by a deliberate species of more complicated villainy, of fraud, robbery and murder, than was ever practiced by Mohammedans or Pagans; in particular, by murders of all kinds; by the blood of the innocent poured upon the ground like water.

    "Now it is your money that pays the African butcher. You, therefore, are principally guilty of all these frauds, robberies and murders. You are the spring that puts all the rest in motion. They would not stir a step without you; therefore the blood of all these wretches who die before their time lies upon your head. "The blood of thy brother crieth against thee from the earth." [Gen. 4:10]

    "O, whatever it costs, put a stop to its cry before it be too late; instantly, at any price, were it the half of your goods, deliver thyself from blood-guiltiness! Thy hands, thy bed, thy furniture, thy house, and thy lands, at present are stained with blood. Surely it is enough; accumulate no more guilt; spill no more the blood of the innocent. Do not hire another to shed blood; do not pay him for

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    doing it. Whether you are a Christian or not, show yourself a man! Be not more savage than a lion or a bear."

    Slavery is not robbery therefore, because it is so much more, and worse. Indeed, to rob man of manhood, and beastialize him down with not only animals, but the dead matter on which brutes feed and tread, makes any farther spoliation simply impossible.

    Or shall we pronounce American slavery adultery, wholesale, unblushing adultery? If not, it must be because, as with robbery, it was something so much worse. For, first, what is adultery but setting aside all rights, privileges and responsibilities, human and divine, of both the marriage and parental relations? Slavery knew no more of marriage and parentage among slaves than among swine. Logically, as well as legally, it could not. And the statutes and court decisions so declared.

    James G. BirneyBut such abomination had not only state sanction, but church sanctification as well. Judge Birney, of Kentucky, once a slave-holder, in his memorable tract entitled: "The American Churches, the Bulwarks of American Slavery," second edition [pp 26-27], revised by the author, cites this instance:

    "In 1835 the following query referring to slaves was presented to the [atheist, demonized] Savannah River Baptist Association of Ministers: "Whether in case of involuntary separation of such a character as to preclude all prospect of future intercourse, the parties ought to be allowed to marry again.'"

    The following was the answer:

    "* * * Such separation among persons situated as are our slaves, is civilly a separation by death. And we believe that in the sight of God, it would be so viewed! * * * The slaves are not free agents, and a dissolution by death is not more entirely without their consent and beyond their control than by such separation."

    Ed. Note: See also other analyses of this, by, e.g.,
  • Deacon James Birney, Bulwarks (1840), pp 26-27
  • Rev. William Goodell, Slavery and Anti-Slavery (1852), p 185
  • Harriet Beecher Stowe, Key (1853), p 205
  • Rep. Owen Lovejoy, "The Barbarism of Slavery" (5 April 1860), p 204b
  • Sen. Charles Sumner, "The Barbarism of Slavery" (4 June 1860) p 312.
  • -53-

    James G. Birney was at one time a slaveholder as well as judge in the courts, and a ruling elder in the Presbyterian church. He was induced to emancipate his slaves, as well as to provide for their future support, taking them over into the free state of Ohio for that purpose, by the faithful and earnest argument and appeal of Theodore D. Weld, an early, eloquent and everyway most efficient apostle and laborer in the anti-slavery field.

    Washing his own hands from the blood and guilt of slave holding, Judge Birney set himself to the work of abolishing the foul system. Among his first endeavors was an attempt to purify the churches, beginning with his own. But neither his official standing in both state and church, nor his high consequent social status availed to shield him from every possible indignity and outrage at the hands of infuriated mobs, composed largely sometimes of members of the churches. Driven from Kentucky he removed to Ohio.

    His descent on Cincinnati, where he had now become known, was a signal to waken all the vengeance of both church and state against him. Meetings were at once called, "to see if the people will permit abolition papers to be published in this city." At the first meeting the postmaster, who was also a minister, presided. A committee of thirteen, all eminent citizens, and eight of them church members, was appointed to wait on Mr. Birney and assure him that his paper must stop, or the meeting would not be responsible for the consequences of its continuance. The chairman of the committee declared that "if the paper were not promptly suspended, a mob, unusual in numbers, determined in purpose, and desolating in its ravages, would be inevitable!" All of which proved true, for the paper did not stop. In the darkness of midnight the mob entered and carried

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    press, types and all else of contents and sunk them in the Ohio river. And twice afterwards was the same outrage perpetrated. No wonder Mr. Burney entitled his memorable tract, published at the time, "The American Churches the Bulwarks of American Slavery." For the title was more than justified on every subsequent page, as will hereafter be made to appear.

    And the word of divine truth uttered by Mr. Weld, and the baptism of fire and water three times administered by the fiendish mob, with full approval of state, church and pulpit, were sufficient consecration of the author of the memorable tract to his subsequent anti-slavery ministry and apostleship.

    But returning to the argument. Not only was slavery adultery, as sanctified and committed by the churches, in thus sundering all marriage rights and responsibilities; it was legally and in solemn compact annihilation of human marriage and parentage. The court decisions contained sentiments such as these: "With consent of their masters, slaves may marry; but in a state of slavery it can produce no civil effect, because slaves are deprived of all civil rights." [Judge Matthews of Louisana]. Attorney-General Delany, of Maryland, held that slaves would not be admonished for incontinence, or punished for adultery or fornication; or prosecuted for petty treason, or for killing a husband, being a slave. The code of Louisiana declared,

    "a slave could not contract matrimony. The association which takes place among slaves, and is called marriage, being properly designated contubernium, a relation without sanctity, and to which no civil rights adhere."
    So the plain, unquestionable fact was, slavery was wholesale, legalized, sanctified concubinage, or adultery, from first to last. Our government was based on the prostrate bodies, souls, and civil,

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    social, marital, parental, educational, moral and religious rights of half a million of immortal beings. In three-quarters of a century their numbers multiplied till at the downfall of the institution there were four millions, and not one legal marriage ever existed in all their generations! And yet, compelled by law thus to live and herd like brute beasts, hundreds of thousands of them were admitted to baptism and sacramental communion and fellowship in all the great evangelical denominations in the land!

    One other attribute of the dreadful system remains to be exposed, and that was murder. Under the written law of slavery, more than seventy offences, when committed by slaves, were punishable with death. One law read, "if any slave shall presume to strike any white person, such slave may be lawfully killed." Of course killed on the spot. A woman or girl would have been killed (undoubtedly many were killed) for defending her person against the lustful attack of her overseer or other white assailant.

    Special laws existed for recapturing escaped slaves at any cost of life to the victims, by first proclaiming them outlaws. The following legal instrument with its accompaniments will suffice to show the way:

    STATE OF NORTH CAROLINA,}
    Lenoir County,}

    Whereas, complaint hath been this day made to us, two of the Justices of the Peace for the said county, by William D. Cobb, of Jones county, that two negro slaves belonging to him, named Ben (commonly known by the name of Ben Fox) and Rigdon, have absented themselves from their said master's service's and are lurking about in the counties of Lenoir and Jones, committing acts of felony;—these are, in the name of the State, to command the said slaves forthwith to surrender themselves, and return home to their said master.

    And we do hereby, by virtue of an act of the Assembly of this State, concerning servants and slaves, intimate and declare, if the said slaves do not surrender themselves and return home to their master immediately after the publication of these presents, that any person may kill and destroy said slaves by such means as he or they think fit, without accusation or impeachment of any crime or offence for so doing, or without incurring any penalty or forfeiture thereby.

    Given under our hands and seals, this 12th day of November, 1836.
    B. COLEMAN, J. P. [Seal.]
    JAMES JONES, J. P. [Seal.]

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    TWO HUNDRED DOLLARS REWARD,—Ran away from the subscriber, a certain negro man named Ben, (commonly known by the name of Ben Fox). Also, one other negro, by the name of Rigdon, who ran away on the 8th of this month.
            I will give the reward of one hundred dollars for each of the above negroes, to be delivered to me or confined in the jail of Lenoir or Jones county, or for the killing of them, so that I can see them.
    November 13, 1836.                                                 W. D. COBB.

    Another advertisement, from the Sumpter County (Alabama) Whig will illustrate the methods of slave hunting in other States besides North Carolina:

    NEGRO DOGS.—The undersigned having bought the entire pack ofNEGRO DOGS of the Hay & Allen stock, he now proposes to catch runaway negroes. His charge will be three dollars a day for hunting and fifteen dollars for catching a runaway. He resides three and one-half miles north of Livingston, near the lower Jones' Bluff road.
    November 6, 1845.                                                        WM. GAMBEL.

    The New York Commercial-Advertiser of June 8th, 1827, contained the following item of news, not uncommon at that time, as the irresponsibility of slave-holders over the lives of their slaves had hardly been questioned:

    "HUNTING MEN WITH DOGS.—A negro who had absconded from his master, and for whom a reward of a hundred dollars was offered, has been apprehended and committed to prison in Savannah."

    The editor who states the fact adds, with as much coolness as though there were no barbarity in the matter, that he did not surrender till he was considerably maimed by the dogs that had been set on him—desperately fighting them, and badly cutting one of them with a sword.

    The St. Francisville (La.) Chronicle of February 1st, 1839, reports a slave-hunt after this sort:

    "Two or three days ago a gentleman of this parish, in hunting runaway negroes, came upon a camp of them in the swamp on Cat Island. He succeeded in arresting two of them, but the third made fight. On being shot in the shoulder, he fled to a sluice, where the dogs succeeded in drowning him before assistance could arrive."

    Had "assistance arrived," would it have been tendered to the dogs or their victim? is a question, to

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    this day. But calling off the dogs altogether, let the subject be illumined a little farther with lights like this, from the Charleston (S. C.) Courier, in 1825.

    TWENTY DOLLARS REWARD.—Ran away from the subscriber, on the 14th instant, a negro girl named Molly. She is 16 or 17 years of age slim made, lately BRANDED ON HER LEFT CHEEK THUS, "R," AND A PIECE IS TAKEN OFF HER EAR ON THE SAME SIDE; THE SAME LETTER IS BRANDED ON THE INSIDE OF BOTH HER LEGS.
    ABNER ROSS, Fairfield District, S. C.

    True, the killing is here omitted, possibly by accident, but if such an atrocity does not involve murder sublimated, what shall be said of this from the Wilmington (N. C.) Advertiser of July 13th, 1838?

    RANAWAY—MY NEGRO MAN. RICHARD.—A reward of twenty-five dollars will be paid for his apprehension, DEAD OR ALIVE! Satisfactory proof will only be required of his being killed. He has with him, in all probability, his wife, Eiza, who ran away from Colonel Thompson, now a resident of Alabama.

    But no more such evidences of the murderous spirit of slavery, can be needed; though the last advertisement suggests an incident in South Carolina, so late as 1844, which is too instructive and assuring not to be given.

    That "wife, Eliza, who ran away from Colonel Thompson," possibly might have a tale unfolded, whose lightest word would have harrowed up the soul. There were many such tales. A young man in South Carolina was seen walking with a young woman, a slave, to whom it was known he was tenderly attached, and whom, it was farther shown, he married and aided to escape from slavery. That was his crime. He was arrested, tried, and found guilty. Sentence of death was pronounced upon him by Judge J. B. O'Neale, in word and spirit as now reproduced:

    "JOHN L. BROWN—It is my duty to announce to you the consequences of the conviction which you heard at Winnsboro', and of the opinion you have just heard read, refusing your two-fold motion in arrest of judgment for a new trial.

    "You are to die! To die an ignominious death—the death on the gallows! This announcement is, to

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    you, I know, most appalling. Little did you dream of it when you stepped into the bar with an air as if you thought it was a fine frolic. But the consequences of crime are just such as you are realizing. Punishment often comes when it is least expected.

    "Let me entreat you to take the present opportunity to commence the work of reformation. Time will be furnished you to prepare for the great change just before you. Of your past life I know nothing, except what your trial furnished. That told me that the crime for which you are to suffer was the consequence of a want of attention on your part to the duties of life. The strange woman snared you. She flattered you with her words, and you became her victim. The consequence was, that, led on by a desire to serve her, you committed the offense of aiding a slave to run away and depart from her master's service; and now, for it you are to die!

    "You are a young man, and I fear you have been dissolute; and if so, these kindred vices have contributed a full measure to your ruin. Reflect on your past life, and make the only useful devotion of the remnant of your days in preparing for death.

    "Remember now thy Creator in the days of thy youth, is the language of inspired wisdom. This comes home appropriately to you in this trying moment.

    "You are young; quite too young to be where you are. If you had remembered your Creator in your past days, you would not now be in a felon's place, to receive a felon's judgment. Still, it is not too late to remember your Creator. He calls early, and He calls late. He stretches out the arms of a Father's love to you—to the vilest sinner—and says: "Come unto me and be saved."

    "You can perhaps, read. If so, read the Scriptures; read them without note, and without comment; and pray to God for His assistance; and you will be able to say when you pass from prison to execution, as a poor slave said under similar circumstances: 'I am glad my Friday has come.' If you cannot read the Scriptures, the ministers of our holy religion will be ready to aid you. They will read and

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    explain to you until you will be able to understand; and understanding, to call upon the only One who can help you and save you—Jesus Christ, the Lamb of God, who taketh away the sin of the world. To Him I commend you. And through Him may you have that opening of the Day-Spring of mercy from on high, which shall bless you here, and crown you as a saint in an everlasting world, forever and ever.

    "The sentence of the [pro-slavery] law is that you be taken hence to the place from whence you came last; thence to the jail of Fairfield District; and that there you be closely and securely confined until Friday, the 26th day of April next; on which day, between the hours of ten in the forenoon and two in the afternoon, you will be taken to the place of public execution, and there be hanged by the neck till your body be dead. And may God have mercy on your soul!"

    No event in anti-slavery history up to that time so stirred the two hemispheres as did this frightful sentence of Judge O'Neale. Even in the British House of Lords, two illustrious members, Brougham and Denman, gave it pathetic and powerful consideration. One London journal said:

    "The dreadful case of John L. Brown has created throughout Great Britain, a sensation of deepest and most painful character. Addresses to the churches in South Carolina have been extensively signed by the independent churches in England and Scotland."

    The Glasgow Argus, among the most important journals of Scotland, twice published the Charge on account of its fearful character, and said of it,

    "we know of nothing more atrocious in the judicial annals of modern times. * * * And what are we to think of a judge, who in passing sentence for what in our country, our land of Freedom, would be looked upon as a praiseworthy act, invokes the sacred name of Deity and the Holy Book of Inspiration as lending sanction to the atrocity about to be committed!"

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    But perhaps the most imposing movement in Great Britain, on this terrible perversion of all justice, as well as outrage on all decency, humanity and charity, was a "Memorial addressed to the Churches of Christ in South Carolina, as representing those of other states," signed by more than thirteen hundred ministers and office-holders in the churches and other benevolent associations of London, and other portions of the kingdom, in solemn protest against it. But it need hardly be told, that all the sympathy felt, all the effort made, all the appeals and memorials sent, eloquent, tender, pathetic, devout as many, if not all of them were, seemed almost wholly thrown away on the press, pulpit, and vast majority of the people of the United States, even though South Carolina did yield to foreign pressure at last, and commuted the sentence to fifty lashes on the bare back; and even they were said to have been remitted on condition that the young man quit the state forever.

    John Greenleaf Whittier But this account though already extended, would not be complete unless the feelings excited in the hearts of the American Abolitionists, in view of the whole scene, could have utterance.

    Let then their favorite and faithful poet, [John Greenleaf] Whittier [1807-1892], be their oracle:


    ON THE SENTENCE OF JOHN L. BROWN.
    Ho! thou who seekest late and long
    A License from the Holy Book
    For brutal lust and hellish wrong,
    Man of the Pulpit look!
    Lift up those cold [unfeeling] and atheist eyes,
    This ripe fruit of thy [atheist] teaching see;
    And tell us how to heaven will rise
    The incense of this sacrifice—
    This blossom of the gallows tree!

    Search out for slavery's hour of need
    Some fitting text of sacred writ;
    Give heaven the credit of a deed
    Which shames the nether pit.

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    Kneel, smooth blasphemer, unto Him
    Whose truth is on thy lips a lie—
    Ask that His bright winged cherubim
    May bend around that scaffold grim
    To guard and bless and sanctify.

    Ho! champion of the people's cause—
    Suspend thy loud and vain rebuke
    Of foreign wrong and Old World's laws—
    Man of the Senate, look!
    Was this the promise of the free,
    The great hope of our early time—
    That slavery's poison vine should be
    Upborne by Freedom's prayer-nurs'd tree
    O'erclustered with such fruits of crime?

    Send out the summons East and West,
    And South and North, let all be there
    Where he who pitied the oppressed
    Swings out in sun and air.
    Let not a Democratic hand
    The grisly hangman's task refuse;
    There let each loyal patriot stand,
    Awaiting slavery's command,
    To twist the rope and draw the noose!

    But vain is irony—unmeet
    Its cold rebuke for deeds which start
    In fiery and indignant beat
    The pulses of the heart.
    Leave studied wit and guarded phrase
    For those who think but do not feel—
    Let MEN speak out in words which raise
    Where'er they fall, an answering blaze
    Like flints which strike the fire from steel.

    Still let a mousing priesthood ply
    Their garbled text and gloss of sin,
    And make the lettered scroll deny
    Its living soul within:
    Still let the place-fed, titled knave
    Plead robbery's right with purchased lips,
    And tell us that our fathers gave
    For Freedom's pedestal, a slave,
    The frieze and moulding, chains and whips!

    But ye who own that Higher Law
    Whose tablets in the heart are set,
    Speak out in words of power and awe
    THAT GOD IS LIVING YET!
    Breathe forth once more those tones sublime
    Which thrilled the burdened prophet's lyre,

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    And in a dark and evil time
    Smote down on Israel's fast of crime
    And gift of blood, A RAIN OF FIRE!

    Oh, not for us the graceful lay
    To whose soft measures lightly move
    The Dryad and the woodland fay,
    O'er-locked by mirth and love!
    But such a Stern and startling strain
    As Britain's hunted bards flung down
    From Snowden to the conquered plain,
    Where harshly clanked the Saxon chain,
    On trampled field and smoking town.

    By Liberty's dishonored name,
    By man's lost hope and failing trust,
    By words and deeds which bow with shame
    Our foreheads to the dust;
    By the exulting Tyrant's sneer,
    Borne to us from the Old World's thrones,
    And by his victims' griefs who hear,
    In sunless mines and dungeons drear,
    How Freedom's land her faith disowns!

    Speak out in ACTS, the time for words
    Has passed; and DEEDS alone suffice;
    In the loud clang of meeting swords
    The softer music dies!
    Act—act in God's name, while ye may!
    Smite from the CHURCH, her leprous limb!
    Throw open to the light of day
    The bondman's cell, and break away
    The chains the STATE has bound on him!

    Ho! every true and living soul,
    To Freedom's perilled altar bear
    The Freeman's and the Christian's whole
    Tongue, pen, and vote, and prayer!
    One last, great battle for the right—
    One short, sharp struggle to be free!
    To do is to SUCCEED—our fight
    Is waged in Heaven's approving sight;
    The smile of God is Victory."

    Ed Note: Rev. Wm. Patton quoted a related poem by John G. Whittier.
    See also, a legal history analysis of slave-rescue action of the type Brown had attempted,
    Edward C. Rogers also linked slavers and atheism, at pp 5 and 33.
    Rev. Wm. Goodell's support of this concept (identifying pro-slavery clergy as atheists)
    and a list of vile clergymen, corrupt supporters of the sin of slavery.

    Severity of punishments inflicted on slaves short of death, were often a thousand times more cruel than death by the halter; not unfrequently terminating in death, though only by whipping. But hanging was not always severe enough, as witness a law of Maryland, enacted in 1729:

    "The slave shall first have the

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    right hand cut off, then be hanged in the usual manner; the head be severed from the body, the body divided into four quarters, and the head and quarters be set up in the most public places of the county where such act was committed."
    And this horrible barbarity could be inflicted by a simple justice's court.

    But it may be said this legislation was before the foundations of this republic were laid. That is true. But in the year 1836, in the city of St. Louis, Missouri, an act was perpetrated, of which the following was the accepted newspaper account, on the spot and over the country:

    On the 28th of April, 1836, in the city of St. Louis, a black man named Mcintosh, who [in attempting self-rescue as per precedents] had stabbed an [extortioner, i.e., felony-committing] officer who had arrested him,
    • was seized by the multitude [lynch mob],

    • fastened to a tree in the midst of the city,

    • wood piled around him, in open day, and in the presence of an immense throng of citizens,

    • he was burned to death.

    The Alton Telegraph thus describes a part of the scene:

    "All was silent as death while the executioners were piling the wood around the victim. He said not a word till he felt that the flames had seized him. He then uttered an awful howl, attempting to sing and pray, then hung his head and suffered in silence.

    "After the flames had surrounded their prey, his eyes burned out of his head, and his mouth apparently parched to a cinder, some one in the crowd more compassionate than the rest, proposed to end his misery by shooting him.

    "But it was replied that he was already out of his pain. "No, no," cried the wretch, "I am not. I am suffering as much as ever. Shoot me! Shoot me!"

    "No," exclaimed one of the fiends standing by the roasting sacrifice, " no, he shall not be shot. I would sooner slack the fire if that would increase his misery!"

    A St. Louis correspondent of a New York paper sent an account of the diabolical deed, of which this is an excerpt:

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    "The shrieks and groans of the victim were loud and piercing, and to observe one limb after another drop into the fire, was awful indeed. In dying, he was about fifteen minutes.

    "I visited the place this morning and saw the body, or the remains of it, burned to a crump. The legs and arms were gone, and only a part of the head and body was remaining."

    A subsequent Judicial decision by judge Luke E. Lawless, of the Circuit Court of Missouri, made at a session of court in St. Louis, was, that as the burning of Mcintosh was the act, directly or indirectly, by countenance of a majority of the citizens, it is a case which transcends the jurisdiction of the grand jury!

    And so the dreadful sacrament was sanctified and solemnized by high judicial decision. And as such atrocities were common while slavery lasted, why need the law of Maryland be shorn of its odium and terror in the popular apprehension, only because it was older than the Declaration of American Independence?

    Assuming that nations are not better than their laws, or that laws are never made till needed, what shall be said of legislation like this? A law of North Carolina provided that:

    If any person shall wilfully kill his own slave, or of any other person, every such offender shall, on conviction, forfeit and pay the sum of seven hundred pounds, and shall forever be rendered incapable of holding or exercising any office.

    And this law was not repealed till the year 1821, if ever. Another section of the same act provided:

    If any person shall, in sudden heat of passion, or by undue correction, kill his own slave, or the slave of any other person, he shall forfeit the sum of three hundred and fifty pounds.

    A still further provision of the same act read thus:

    If any person shall wilfully cut out the tongue, put out the eye, castrate, or cruelly scald or burn any

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    slave, or deprive any slave of any limb or member, or shall inflict any other cruel punishment, other than by whipping or beating with a switch, horse-whip or cow-skin, or by putting on irons, or imprisoning such slave, such person, for every such offence, shall forfeit and pay one hundred pounds.

    Judge Stroud, in his carefully prepared "Sketch of Laws Relating to Slavery," says in his latest edition, (1856): "This, so far as I can learn, has been suffered to disgrace the statute book to the present hour. Amid all the mutations which Christianity has effected within the last century, she has not been able to conquer the spirit which dictated this law."

    And not to speak of the shameful outrage, so denounced in Deuteronomy, xxiii, i, what must be thought of the decency, humanity, not to say religion, of a people that enacts, supports, sanctifies a law which beats without limit, without mercy, with horse-whip, cowskin or other missile, a human being, man, woman, child, unrebuked, unless the last stroke should produce immediate death?

    With one more well authenticated fact and one other witness, and he none other than Thomas Jefferson himself, the question as to the character of slavery shall be submitted to readers, to history, to posterity. The outrage to be described was witnessed by John James Appleton, Esq., whom Hon. David Lee Child and his illustrious wife, Mrs. Lydia Maria Child, endorse as "a gentleman of high attainments and accomplishments," a secretary of legation at Rio Janeiro, Madrid and the Hague, commissioner at Naples and charge d'affaires at Stockholm. Mr. Appleton was present at the burial of a female slave in Mississippi, who had been whipped to death by her master, for being gone longer on an errand than was thought necessary. She protested under the terrible

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    torture that she was ill and had to rest in the fields. To complete the climax of horror, she was delivered of a dead child while undergoing the punishment!! Is it strange that she had to rest by the way? But we will hasten to our last witness.

    To-day as I write, the Democratic party, party of Thomas Jefferson, is celebrating here in Massachusetts, a political success, almost unexampled under the circumstances, in state elections, since the party was first inaugurated. The tribes of Israel never claimed Abraham as their father with more devout pride and filial reverence, than have the Democrats of this nation Thomas Jefferson as theirs, since their party first learned to lisp his name.

    And those tribes crying, "Crucify Him, crucify Him," in the court-room of Pilate, or mocking their victim as he climbed Mount Calvary, bearing his cross in sweating agony, did not more dishonor their patriarchal father and founder than did the Democratic party and their Whig accomplices on the plains of Texas, murdering the Mexicans in a bloody war to reinstate slavery where the Mexican government, with its Roman Catholic religion, had not many years before, abolished it, as all humanity hoped, forever. That was almost forty years ago. Undoubtedly, devotion to slavery sent the old Whig party to a scarcely too early grave. Worship of the same unclean and bloody Moloch, stove down democratic rule, from the kindled wrath of the Infinite Justice around Fort Sumter, until the victories won yesterday in so many States of this Union, and proudly celebrated to-day, give sign almost unmistakable, of its probable return at the next presidential election.

    And now the next and last witness as to the whole quality and character of slavery, even as he saw it

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    and himself embraced it, is the patriarchal American Democrat, Thomas Jefferson [1743-1826] himself.

    Thomas Jefferson His memorable "Notes on the State of Virginia," so often cited in the past, so greatly disregarded while slavery continued, were revised and published in 1787, when the problem of slavery was shaking the new republic to its foundation.

    The section relating to slavery contains so many general observations on human relations and obligations, individual as well as collective, social as well as civil and governmental, with a profoundly reverent recognition of higher authority than any man-made institutions, or constitutions, that it surely is not too much to declare that a return of the Democratic party to power will be a blessing or scourge and curse, exactly in proportion as it shall follow, or reject the doctrines and counsels of its justly venerated founder and progenitor, as laid down in the passage from his "Notes on the State of Virginia," here reproduced:


    "There must doubtless be an unhappy influence on the manners of our people, produced by the existence of Slavery among us. The whole commerce between master and slave is a perpetual exercise of the most boisterous passions, the most unremitting despotism on the one part, and degrading submission on the other.

    "Our children see this and learn to imitate it; for man is an imitative animal. This quality in him is the germ of all education. From his cradle to his grave, he is learning to do what he sees others do. If a parent could find no motive, either in his philanthropy or his self-love, for restraining the intemperance of passion toward his slave, it should always be a sufficient one that his child is present. But generally it is not sufficient. The parent storms, the child looks on, catches the lineaments of wrath, puts on the same airs in the circle of smaller slaves, gives a loose to the worst of passions, and thus nursed and educated, and daily exercised in tyranny, cannot but be stamped by

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    it with odious peculiarities. The man must be a prodigy who can retain his manners and morals undepraved by such circumstances.

    "And with what execration should the statesman be loaded, who, permitting one-half the citizens thus to trample on the rights of the other, transforms those into despots, and these into enemies, destroys the morals of one part and the amor patriæ of the other! For if a slave can have a country in this world, it must be any other in preference to that in which he is born to live and labor for another; in which he must lock up the faculties of his nature; contribute, as far as depends on his individual endeavors, to the evanishment of the human race, or entail his own miserable condition on the endless generations proceeding from him.

    "With the morals of the people, their industry also is destroyed. For in a warm climate no man will labor for himself who can make another labor for him. This is so true, that of the proprietors of slaves, a very small proportion indeed are ever seen to labor. And can the liberties of a nation be thought secure when we have removed their only firm basis-a conviction in the minds of the people that these liberties are the gift of God? That they are not to be violated but with his wrath?

    "Indeed, I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just: that his justice cannot sleep forever: that considering numbers, and natural means only, a revolution of the wheel of Fortune, an exchange of situation is among possible events: that it may become probable by supernatural interference! The Almighty has no attribute which can take sides with us in such a contest!

    "But it is impossible to be temperate and pursue this subject through the various considerations of policy, of morals, of history, natural and civil. We must be contented to hope they will force their way into every mind. I think a change already perceptible since the origin of the present revolution. The spirit of the master is abating; that of the slave rising from the dust; his condition molifying; the way I hope preparing, under the auspices of heaven, for a total

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    emancipation, And that this is disposed, in the order of events, to be with the consent of the masters, rather than by their extirpation."

    Such was American slavery. Jefferson proved its historian as well as prophet, to wondrous extent. Happy for the nation, had it heeded his wise and timely counsels. Happy for it would it even now learn to regard them.

    When, before or since our slave system, did governments ever punish with death for seventy offences, and then forbid, under penalties almost as severe as death, to teach one of the victims of such tyranny to read one law of man or God, in any book, the Bible not excepted? It may have been, But when, or where? What but cold-blooded murder must such governing have been! To rid the land of such a plague, no wonder it required an army on our side only, of more than two million seven hundred thousand men, half a million of whom never returned!

    And then, as a crowning, sealing sacrifice, an idolized president [Ed. Note: Abraham Lincoln] massacred, murdered, and his tall form stretched across their premature graves, while not this nation only, but foreign peoples stood aghast! All this, not to speak of moneyed cost and loss; nor counting the sighs and tears, bereavements and mournings of mothers, sisters, widows and orphans! All this, not reckoning moral and spiritual, as well as financial impoverishment and desolation, not to be restored perhaps till our third and fourth generations! Such was part of the price paid to redeem the land from its uncommon curse.

    Men called the war of sword and bayonet, Rebellion. It might have been rebellion on the part of slavery and the South. But to the North it was Retribution. The. South claimed as property, the slave. But the North, by the terms of the Federal

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    Union, held him pinned down to the earth as with the point of the bayonet. From the torture-chambers of the imprisoned slave our guilt ascended, by silent but sure evaporation, until it hung in threatening clouds over all the sky, waiting the dread hour when the Infinite Patience could endure it no longer!

    At last the command was given, and the tempest and thunder shook the very heavens, saying to the North, "Give up;" to the South, "Keep not back." No lightning-rod shielded either; and Slavery, with all its reeking, shrieking altars, and ghastly paraphernalia of whips, fetters, bloodhounds and red-hot branding irons, was swept away in cataclysms of blood and fire!

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    CHAPTER IV.

    ANTI-SLAVERY — WHAT IT WAS NOT.
    AND WHAT IT WAS.

    Such account could slavery give of itself, "Peculiar Institution " it was often called. But it was not peculiar to the southern states. Fortunes were made by the African slave trade, even in little Rhode Island. The history of slavery and slave trading in Massachusetts is one of the most surprising volumes ever issued by the American press. New Hampshire held slaves.

    George WashingtonGeneral Washington himself while President of the United States, hunted a slave woman and her child all the way into that then remote state.

    Vermont, had a fugitive slave case in 1808. But the brave Judge Harrington stunned the remorseless claimant with his decision that "nothing less than a bill of sale from the Almighty could establish ownership" in his victim.

    Ed. Note:
  • Senator Charles Sumner in 1860 cited both this concept and this case.
  • Edward C. Rogers in 1855 traced back to American-Revolution-era concepts.
  • Rev. John Rankin cited parental context.
  • And he [Judge Harrington], too, returned home despoiled and shamed.

    Slavery was the sin and crime of north as well as south. It was sustained by the government, it was sanctified by almost the whole religion of the nation. I have read that even the Quakers gravely considered the question, not whether it was right to hold slaves, but whether it was proper to brand them with red hot marking irons. To the credit of that sect, however, it should be told that it was among the first, if not the very first, to cast the accursed thing forever out of its fellowship.

    Three clauses in the federal constitution were so interpreted as to brand the whole nation as slave-holders, slave-hunters and slave-traders; and one of

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    those clauses was in two words, "suppress insurrections." And another was in this apparently innocent, inoffensive period:
    "No person held to service or labor in one state under the laws thereof, escaping into another, shall, in consequence of any law or regulation therein, be discharged from such service or labor; but shall be delivered up on claim of the party to whom such service or labor may be due."

    George WashingtonAnd under that guarantee, which, as president, he was solemnly sworn to execute, did George Washington himself pursue a slave mother [Ona Maria Judge] and her child from the Potomac to the Piscatauqua as remorselessly as though they had been a sheep and her lamb. Fortunately, however, for the victims, they escaped and lived and died in the old Granite State.

    Ed. Note: For details, see note in Alvan Stewart, Legal Argument (1845), p 50, citing Prof. Clarence Lusane, Ph.D., Black History in the White House (San Francisco: City Lights Books, 2011), Chapter 1, pp 35-47.

    Our African slave trade was a piracy that paled all ordinary buccaneering into innocence. That traffic, with all its nameless terrors and tortures, was secured to the United States and positively protected by this specious and apparently inoffensive phrase in the ninth section of Article I in the federal constitution:

    "The migration or importation of such persons as any of the states now existing shall think proper to admit, shall not be prohibited by the Congress prior to the year one thousand eight hundred and eight, but a tax or duty may be imposed on such importations, not exceeding ten dollars for each person."

    And Mr. Madison, afterwards president, declared, and it is part of our history, that "the southern states would not have entered the union without the temporary permission of that trade."

    The first fugitive slave law was enacted in 1793. But as anti-slavery sentiment increased, through the faithful and persistent labors of the uncompromising Abolitionists, "underground railroads," as they

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    were called, multiplied, and Judge Harrington's decisions became more frequent.

    Underground railroads were only lines of travel through the northern states to Canada, over which, under cover of night, great numbers of slaves were conveyed, sometimes in whole families; one anti-slavery man hurrying them from his town to the next, or farther, if necessary, and then another taking them in charge, and so on till they were safely landed in Canada, beyond reach of further pursuit or danger.

    Harriet Beecher Stowe"Uncle Tom's Cabin" [by Harriet Beecher Stowe] has no more interesting chapter than that in which "Senator Bird's" adventure is described with his night express train over that memorable but dark and dangerous highway out of democratic despotism to freedom in a land of kings and queens. And large numbers escaped with greater security, as their friends multiplied along the way, by their own unaided efforts.

    So [Ed. Note: pursuant to Southern slaver reaction to escapes to freedom, like when the East German Communists built the Berlin Wall in 1961, to keep people in] another and severer fugitive law was demanded, and in 1850 enacted.

    That law, in the first place,

    • made every inch of our country, and the deck of every vessel, on sea, lake or river, hunting ground for slave-holder and kidnapper.

    • And whoever refused to aid in the bloody, brutal business of chasing, seizing and holding the human prey, when called into the service, or harbored or concealed the victims so that they escaped, was punished "by fine not exceeding six thousand dollars, and imprisonment not exceeding six months."

    • And, moreover, could be then held in an action for damages to the slave claimant, for one thousand dollars for every slave lost through refusal to obey that most shameful as well as unrighteous and inhuman edict.

    And many of the best families in the land were beggared only for religiously observing the Golden Rule and remembering and-

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    regarding them who were in bonds as bound with them. [Heb. 13:3].

    As early as the year 1840 [Ed. Note: meaning, next election after anti-slavery newspapers raised the issue], efforts began to be made by some anti-slavery men, who had faith or hope in political action against slavery, to change the interpretations of the constitution and decisions of the Supreme Court so as to make not only the clauses just now cited, but the whole instrument a proclamation and protection of universal liberty. Foremost among these men was Mr. Gerrit Smith [1797-1874], of New York.

    Ed. Note: And others,
  • Samuel May (1836)
  • Nathaniel Rogers (1837)
  • George Mellen (1841)
  • Alvan Stewart (1845)
  • Lysander Spooner (1845)
  • Benjamin Shaw (1846)
  • Howard James (1849)
  • Joel Tiffany (1849)
  • William Goodell (1852)
  • Abraham Lincoln (1854)
  • Frederick Douglass (1860),
    as per list, supra, p 29.
  • A third political party was inaugurated, and James G. Birney, whose name has already had honorable mention in these pages, was the first nominated anti-slavery candidate for the presidency, and whose first anti-slavery works, as a repentant slave-holder, entitled him to such distinction. But his name was withdrawn after his first vote was given in 1844, and John P. Hale of New Hampshire, succeeded him. He also was superseded in the candidacy for one who undoubtedly might control a larger vote, Martin Van Buren [1782-1862], but whose anti-slavery reputation was surely of most questionable character.

    Abraham LincolnBut the popular sentiment, press, pulpit, everything, everywhere prevailed over all such [anti-slavery parties'] innovation [attempts to get an anti-slavery man elected President] till the [formation in 1854 of the new Republican Party; the 1860 split in the Democrat Party; and the] election of Abraham Lincoln, who in his [widely circulated] inaugural address on March 4th, 1861, declared for slave-holding and slave-hunting in these strange [legalese], but surely ever memorable words:



    "I understand a proposed amendment, which amendment I have not seen, has passed Congress, to the effect that the federal government shall never interfere with the domestic institutions of the states, including that of persons held to service.

    "To avoid misconstruction of what I have said, I now depart from my purpose not to speak of particular amendments, so far as to say, that holding such a provision

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    to be now implied constitutional law, I have no objection to its being made express and irrevocable."

    Mark the words, "express and irrevocable." Express: not implied; not doubtful. Irrevocable: not to be revoked; more than statute of Medes and Persians. [Dan. 6:15].

    Ed. Note: Observe Lincoln's brilliance in making this type comment. While it superficially appeared to give the South permanent slavery, Lincoln knew in reality as per his 1854 speech, above-cited, that slavery would be endable, not by federal government action per se, but by standard litigation getting court orders enforcing the already existing common law!! as per the Somerset v Stewart precedent!
    Note that Lincoln was for "service" (meaning in law, apprenticeship or indentured servants/employees), not "servitude." The words are sharply distinguished in law, legalese. The former requires a contract between the two parties!
    Southern politicians were not fooled by Lincoln's legalese words; they rejected his 'no objection[!!]' words as the legalese technicalities they were (granting the South nothing in reality).
    Note denunciation of the May 1860 nomination process of Lincoln for the Presidency: that it “was not 'eminently respectable,' nor distinguished for its 'dignity and decorum.' On the other hand, the satanic element was very strongly developed.”-Quoted on page 245 of The Glorious Burden: The American Presidency (New York: Harper & Row, 1968) by Stejan Lorant.
    Southern politicians, Confederates, themselves demonized, therefore continued their 1861-1865 rebellion, as they themselves were well aware of the unconstitutionality of slavery themselves, but as dirty low-life politicians, they preferred pandering to their immoral constituents who wanted slavery continued regardless of the rule of law.
    Kindly anti-slavery clergymen such as Rev. Pillsbury WERE fooled though!! (as Pillsbury's immediate paragraphs here show) by Lincoln saying he was for "service." They did not realize the word distinction from "servitude."
    They did not see that Lincoln's immediate concern at the moment, 4 March 1861, around 12:30 pm, was trying to head off the upcoming war with a million casualties. Lincoln deemed THAT a more immediate crisis, than explaining legal-stylistic technicalities' wording (meaning the opposite of what's on the surface), to kindly peace-loving clergymen such as Rev. Pillsbury. Such individuals, Lincoln knew, of course, were not a mass-killer threat to anybody(!); peace-loving clergy such as Rev. Pillsbury were not massing troops to maim and kill Yankees in the hundreds of thousands!!
    In this context, here are what Lincoln's words actually meant:

    "I understand a proposed amendment, which amendment I have not seen [has not been ratified by 3/4 of the states, thus has no legal effect whatever!], has passed Congress, to the effect that the federal government [the political portion, Congress, as distinct from courts] shall never interfere with the domestic institutions of the states [thus excluding slavery, as it had never been constitutionalized or even established in any of the states!!], including that of persons held to service [of which there were none!, as slavery never involved a contract between slave and master, holding the slave to service!].

    "To avoid [really, to cause!!] misconstruction of what I have said, I now depart from my purpose not to speak of particular amendments, so far as to say, that holding [assuming arguendo something he denied as per his 1854 speech!!] such a provision to be now implied [by the Supreme Court in rulings he would appoint judges to reverse!!] constitutional law [because slavery was NOT in the Constitution], I have no objection to its being made express and irrevocable [meaning, already passed by Congress before he took office!!; Congress' log books or 'parliamentary procedure minutes,' of what it has voted on are 'express and irreversible,' meaning, you cannot pretend that something Congress voted on, was not voted on!!]."


    Excellent word choices, his! They gave the South nothing! And they fooled abolitionists such as Rev. Pillsbury who would favor Emancipation by court orders!! But sadly, they didn't fool slavers!

    Thus to slave-breeding as well as slave-working; to slave-buying, selling, holding and hunting, was the whole nation and government committed under the presidency, not of a southern, but a northern man; not of the Democratic, but the Republican party, and, as was claimed, the very best of that party. And the whole national domain was made human hunting ground, from Plymouth Rock and Bunker Hill, to the wilds of Alaska, and the Golden Gate.

    And by the fugitive slave law, every man and woman was held to the bloodhound business of hunting slaves, when required by the officers, under heavy fines and cruel imprisonments. Such, in the Christian year one thousand eight hundred and sixty-one, was the culmination of all anti-slavery political parties.

    The American Anti-Slavery Society had also a constitution. Its declared aim was,

    "to convince all our fellow-citizens, by arguments addressed to [slavers, e.g., to their] the understanding and conscience, that slave-holding is a heinous crime in the sight of God; and that the duty, safety and best interests of all concerned, require its immediate abandonment, without expatriation." Another declaration was this: "The society will never in any way countenance the oppressed in vindicating their rights by resorting to physical force."

    A declaration of sentiment, issued at the inauguration of the society, spoke thus:

    Our trust for victory is solely in God. We may be personally defeated, but our principles never. Truth, justice, reason, humanity, must and will gloriously

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    triumph. * * * We shall send forth agents to lift up the voice of remonstrance and warning. We shall circulate unsparingly, anti-slavery tracts and periodicals. We shall enlist the pulpit and the press.

    And faithfully, consistently, persistently, without concealment, without compromise, did the true abolitionists continue so to act to the end. In an enterprise solely moral and religious, as well as philanthropic, the first, most earnest appeal was to the church and pulpit. A more devoutly religious man than was Mr. Garrison at the outset, or more soundly orthodox and evangelical in sentiment, could not be found. That has already been sufficiently shown. And his strongest, kindest, most affectionate appeals in behalf of the enslaved were first made to the ministers and churches of Boston, the then venerable Dr. Beecher being most eminent among them.

    I was a very humble unordained minister in a little New Hampshire town, where I was preaching as a candidate for settlement, when my first official testimony was asked and cheerfully given in relation to the crime and curse of slavery.

    The county anti-slavery society where I was, issued, through a committee whose chairman was the afterwards well and widely known Stephen S. Foster, a Circular to all the ministers of the county, respectfully asking their several answers to the following questions, relative to the duty of the church and clergy of the country on the subject of slavery:

    1. Do you, or do you not believe that a man's right to liberty is derived from God, and is therefore inalienable?

    2. Do you regard slave-holding, under all circumstances, as a sin against God, and an immorality?

    3. Do you approve and support the principles and measures of the American Anti-Slavery Society and kindred organizations?

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    4. Do you allow the claims of the Anti-Slavery Society the same prominence in the pulpit exercises of the Sabbath as those of other benevolent institutions?

    5. Are the slave-owners excluded from the communion of the church to which you minister, and slave-owning ministers from the pulpit?

    6. Are you in favor of withdrawing all Christian fellowship from slave-owners?

    The recommendation of, e.g.,
  • Rev. George Bourne, An Address to the Presbyterian Church, Enforcing the Duty of Excluding All Slaveholders from The "Communion of Saints" (New York: 1833)
  • Rev. John G. Fee, Non-Fellowship With Slaveholders The Duty of Christians (New York: John A. Gray, 1849)
  • 7. Are you in favor of supporting such benevolent institutions as admit slave-owners to participate in their management, and knowingly receive into their treasuries the avails of the unrequited toil of the slave, and the human-flesh auctions of the south?

    Readers, young and old, can see by these crucial questions what stern demands were made on the abolitionists at that day, who would keep their hands clean, their garments unspotted from the guilt of slavery, whose victims then numbered two and a half millions.

    Many ministers, to whom the letter of inquiry was sent, paid no attention to it. Some answered cautiously and prudently, having in their churches and societies influential men whose political party ties, if not their own personal opinions, bound them as with iron bands, to the accursed institution. A very few ventured as far in testimony or protest against the system as possible without periling their denominational position and fellowship. Perhaps the only satisfactory response in all respects to the questions propounded, was in part as given below :

    Your sixth question is: "Are you in favor of withdrawing all Christian fellowship from slave-owners?"

    A step so important as this should not be rashly taken. * * * And yet to those who would be separate from all sin, who would "have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness [Eph. 5:11]," what question

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    could be of easier solution? With those fell demons of darkness, whose awful cruelties are equalled only by their shameless and unblushing licentiousness, none should expect me to hold "Christian fellowship."

    But shall I with the more humane and outwardly moral? For my part, I can conceive of no possible circumstances where one person can claim property in another, under our slave system, without being guilty of iniquity and oppression, and of giving countenance and sanction to whatever abuses may result from that system. I might own a slave, and so far as simple treatment is concerned, do him no injustice. I might feed, blanket, bed and house him as tenderly as I do my horse. I might give him mental and moral instruction so far as the laws regulating slavery allowed; and, were it possible, make him as happy as the angels before the heavenly throne. * * *

    But what then? If I own him under the slave system of this nation, I lend my influence, countenance, sanction and sanctification to all the atrocities connected with that system. Not one pain nor pang could be inflicted on the tortured slave, by cart-whip or cat-hauling; the poison tooth of blood-hound, the murderous rifle-bullet, or red hot branding-iron, or the soul-crushing agonies of the mother torn from her helpless babes and sold on the auction block, forever from their sight, not one of these, nor any other of the nameless and horrible outrages and cruelties of the accursed plague, might not be justly chargeable to my account!

    My very virtues as a slave-holder might do more to perpetuate the system than all the vices which cluster around it, till I might indeed be the most wicked slave-holder in the land. What better palliation could the average slave-holder plead than that such a man as I was a breeder and holder of slaves? * * *

    In my own opinion, the most guilty of all among the slave-holders are those whose professions are loudest and strongest in favor of morality and religion; the minister, the elder, the deacon and private member of the church.

    In one word, as Judge Birney, a ruling elder in the Presbyterian church, has already proclaimed and proved: "The American Churches are the Bulwarks

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    of American Slavery." Did not their influence, sanctify slavery, its own odiousness would be its overthrow. And must I commune in sacramental fellowship with those who of all others are guiltiest in relation to the most daring system of iniquity that ever cursed the earth or scourged the inhabitants thereof ? O, my soul, come not thou into their secret; unto their assembly, mine honor, be not thou united!" [Gen. 49:6].

    To-day, when everyone is, or would be thought an abolitionist, or the descendant of an abolitionist, such sentiments seem only reasonable and right; only logical and consistent; slavery being everywhere and always a heinous sin and crime. But in 1840, when slavery had yet before it almost a quarter of a century in which to plague us, it was not so. Slave-holders were welcomed to the pulpits and sacramental suppers of the churches in every state and county, if not in every single town, where churches existed. And the faithful and devout abolitionists, however evangelical in sentiment, were as universally cast out. There were exceptions, but so rare as rather to affirm and confirm than impeach the rule.

    And the political test of the time was not less stern and severe. The great political parties vied with each other in zeal and devotion to the demands of the national idol. Louisiana and Florida had already been purchased by the government, in obedience to its behest, though in avowed violation of the federal constitution. All the Indian tribes in the southern seaboard states had been driven from their homes, their churches and school-houses, their printing presses, and the graves of their ancestors, with unheard of haste and cruelty, that their coveted lands might be seized and doomed to slave-holding, the Seminoles in Florida only excepted. And General Taylor, with government troops, supplemented by imported Cuban

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    blood-hounds, was soon to complete the bloody business by exterminating such as presumed to resist, and capturing and banishing the rest to the western wilds, then unexplored and almost unknown.

    Arrangements were making, secret and open, to seize Texas from Mexico, at whatever cost of national dishonor and war, to reinstate slavery, which Roman Catholic Mexico had abolished almost twenty years before, and then annex it [as a pro-slavery entity] to the United States.

    Ed. Note: Mexican anti-slavery writings date as far back as Bartolomé de Albornoz, Prof of Law, University of Mexico, Anti-Slavery (1573).
    "In 1829 [Mexico's President] Vicente Guerrero issued a decree for the abolition of slavery. Slavery scarcely existed in Mexico outside [American-dominated] Texas. . . . —Henry Bamford Parkes, A History of Mexico (Boston: Houghton-Mifflin Co, 1938-1970), p 201.
    Under President Thomas Jefferson (1801-1809), "the Neutral Ground Treaty [was made and] remained in effect until 1821, when ratification of the Treaty of Amity, Settlement and Limits between the United States of America and His [Spain's] Catholic Majesty recognized the Sabine [River, not the Rio Grande River 120 miles further south] as the official boundary between [the U.S.] Louisiana and Texas." —Milton Lomask, Aaron Burr: The Conspiracy and Years of Exile 1805-1836 (New York: Farrar Straus Giroux, 1982), p 169.

    And "by [Jefferson] endorsing a neutral region admittedly bounded on the west by [then] Spanish soil, the United States had relinquished its often-asserted claim to most if not all of Texas" (p 170).


    So when the U.S. committed aggression against Mexico, pretending the Rio Grande River 120 miles into Mexico was the boundary, it was lying, and its own records show it was lying. The 1821 Treaty is in the U.S.' own records!—the American State Papers—Foreign Relations, Vol. IV.
    See also Rev. William Goodell, Slavery and Anti-Slavery (New York: William Harned Pub, 1852), Chapter 24, pp. 272-279; and Sen. Thomas Corwin, "Unjust National Acquistions" (Washington: 11 Feb 1847).
    For background on the war of aggression against Mexico, see, e.g., Benjamin Lundy, The War in Texas: A Review of the Facts and Circum-stances Showing that This Contest is A Crusade against Mexico, Set on Foot and Supported by Slaveholders, Land-Speculators, Etc. In Order to Re-Establish, Extend, and Perpetuate The System of Slavery and the Slave Trade (Philadelphia: Merrihew and Gunn, 1837).
    Starting a war of aggression is a war crime. “Our position is that whatever grievances a nation may have, however objectionable it finds the status quo, aggressive warfare is an illegal means for settling those grievances or for altering those conditions.”—Supreme Court Justice Robert Jackson, the American prosecutor at the Nuremberg trials, in his opening statement to the tribunal (1946). "To initiate a war of aggression, therefore, is not only an international crime; it is the supreme international crime differing only from other war crimes in that it contains within itself the accumulated evil of the whole.”—Justice Jackson, supra, cited by Scott Ritter, "Let history judge" (27 February 2006).
    The U.S. presidents promoting the war of aggression against Mexico were thus war criminals.

    Both the whig and democratic parties were emulating each other in their zeal and devotion to so vile an object by such unhallowed means. And so the anti-slavery demand on the parties, as well as on the churches, was to come out of them.

    No religious or theological opinions were questioned, no political party preferences were challenged, Baptist, Congregationalist, Methodist or Presbyterian might remain true to their chosen creed, only treat slavery in the church as other robbery, adultery, and murder. So whig and democrat, only let the equality of all men, as announced in the Declaration of Independence, be solemnly observed and applied, might remain whig and democrat forever.

    For themselves, the American Anti-Slavery Society abolitionists, at their national anniversary in 1844, adopted the resolution below, to which they adhered till the slave-holders' rebellion made sure the end of slavery:

    "Resolved, That secession from the present United States government is the duty of every abolitionist; since no one can take office or cast a vote for another to hold office under the United States constitution, without violating his anti-slavery principles, and rendering himself an abettor of the slave-holder in his sin."

    To expect to find editors, missionaries and apostles able, ready, willing to adopt, inculcate and defend doctrines and measures thus uncompromising and extreme,

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    was to pay high compliment to human nature, courage and character. But such appeared, both women and men.

    Indeed, long before this time [1844], the slave power had revealed itself in almost every possible way, both in state and church, as ready to execute terrible vengeance on any who dared refuse quick obedience to its behests, or even to question its right to reign supreme.

    Ed. Note: Slave-Power
    Vengeance Continues
    via Poisonings and
    Mass Criminalizations

    At the opening of the anti-slavery apocalypse [revelation] by Garrison in 1830, the whole nation—state, church, government, religion, education, trade, commerce,—all were held subservient to its sovereign will and pleasure. Every conceivable human interest, nearly every distinguished clergyman, politician, office-seeker as well as office-holder, bowed reverently in our temple of Moloch, humbly exclaiming, "Not my will, but thine be done."

    Already had Garrison been heavily fined, and imprisoned in Baltimore, only for exposing in a newspaper an atrocious instance of cruelty in our coastwise slave trade. In Boston he had been mobbed, stripped nearly naked, dragged by a rope through the streets till rescued by the authorities and shut in the strongest jail, to save his imperilled life.

    A worthy minister in New Hampshire, engaged to give an anti-slavery lecture, was arrested as a "common brawler," jerked from his knees and pulpit to trial as he was offering his opening prayer.

    Churches, school-houses, orphan asylums and dwellings of colored people, in Providence, New York, Philadelphia and Cincinnati, had been mobbed, sacked, burned down; twelve in New York and one church; more than forty in Philadelphia and two churches; and one church and many dwellings in Cincinnati.

    And many colored men were severely injured in their persons, and girls and women grossly outraged by their diabolical assailants. So were they hated for their color; and because

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    millions of their kindred were slaves to democratic, republican and Christian masters. Pennsylvania Hall, in Philadelphia, was erected at cost of forty thousand dollars, wholly for anti-slavery and other philanthrophic purposes.

    During an anti-slavery convention, in 1838, that spacious and beautiful structure was mobbed, set on fire, and burned to ashes, with all its contents. A valuable library and much other property were consumed in the flames. Nor did the city authorities, from mayor and aldermen to sheriff and police, utter a protest; still less proffer any protection, or word of sympathy to the innocent and peaceful sufferers.

    Rev. Elijah Parish Lovejoy, native of Maine, graduate of Waterville College, and brother of Owen Lovejoy, afterwards member of Congress, perished in an attempt to protect his press and printing office from the fate of Pennsylvania Hall. [Details].

    It was in Alton, Illinois, north of St. Louis, on the opposite bank of the Mississippi, that the most heart-rending and horrible instance of burning a slave to death over a slow fire in St. Louis-in the year 1837, had just been made public, as has been already described [pp 64-65].

    The St. Louis newspapers, though generally approving the devilish deed, stirred the civilized world with their account of it. Of course the editorial pen of Lovejoy was hot with hallowed fire at the awful recital. His office and life were soon threatened. He appealed to the authorities for protection. He might as well have looked to the murderers of the poor slave. His friends counselled him to flee. He answered:

    "I dare not flee away from Alton. The crisis has come and I have counted the cost. Should I attempt to flee I should feel that the Angel of the Lord was pursuing me with flaming sword, wherever I went. And it is because I fear God, that I am not afraid of all

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    who oppose me in this wicked city!"

    This was the fourth printing press he [Rev. Lovejoy] had set up. All the others had been ruthlessly destroyed by the same mob violence that now assailed this. Refused all municipal protection, he and a few brave friends entered the building alone. They fearlessly faced the mob till the building was in flames. As they came out, Lovejoy received five bullets and fell dead. Three of the bullets were taken out of his breast. He was but thirty-two and left a young wife and babes. When his mother read the account of his death, she said: "It is well; I had rather he died defending his principles, than that he should have forsaken them!" So it became all who entered the conflict to count well the cost.

    Ed. Note: See also p 43. Harriet Beecher Stowe, Key (1853), p 228, elaborates on this slaver-committed murder in reprisal for exercising First Amendment freedom-of-the-press rights against slavery.

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    CHAPTER V.

    ACTS OF THE ANTI-SLAVERY APOSTLES, WITH SOME
    PERSONAL SKETCHES AND EXPERIENCES.

    My first intimate acquaintance and companion in travel in the missionary field, was Stephen Symonds Foster. To him was largely due my first and best lessons in anti-slavery work.

    Ed. Note: Rev. Foster wrote The Brotherhood of Thieves: or, A True Picture of the American Church and Clergy (1843), exposing clergy depravity and immroality on the slavery subject.

    My preparation for the Congregational Ministry was all made in less than four years from the reaper and the plough. The three years regular theological course was at Gilmanton, New Hampshire, where attempt was made to stretch the charter of an academical institution to cover an entire theological department. The enterprise failed, though in those years, the little, remote hamlet of "Gilmanton Corner," aspired and strove hard to become famous as the seat of Gilmanton Theological Seminary, I was first to enter the new department, and for several days one professor, and he not inaugurated nor installed, and one student, were all that were visible of that "School of the Prophets."

    But during my three years, the usual three regular classes were formed, though with small numbers, and two professors were elected and inaugurated. Some good and useful men were graduated, but in a few years, "Gilmanton Theological Seminary" ceased to be, and was known no more. My own three years' course seemed to me so short, preceded as it had been by neither collegiate nor academical study, that I determined on a year at Andover. It continued, however, only through the long fall and winter term;

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    and then, after a short anti-slavery traveling agency, I commenced the work of a parish minister in a small New Hampshire town, but without ordination. My religious sentiments were of the true Gilmanton and Andover complexion. The creed of both was the same, though my printed copy was the Andover, a pamphlet of thirty pages octavo. A few extracts may be interesting to readers in these stirring theological times:
    "Every person appointed or elected a professor in this seminary shall, on the day of his inauguration into office, and in presence of the trustees, publicly make and subscribe the following declarations:

    "I believe that there is one, and but one, living and true God;

    that the word of God contained in the scriptures of the Old and New Testament, is the only perfect rule of faith and practice;

    * * * that in the Godhead are three Persons: The Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost;

    that these three are one God, the same in substance, equal in power and glory;

    that Adam, the federal head and representative uf the human race, was placed in a state of probation, and that, in consequence of his disobedience, all his descendants were constituted sinners;

    that by nature every man is personally depraved, destitute of holiness, unlike, and opposed to God, and that previously to the renewing agency of the Divine Spirit, all his moral actions are adverse to the character of God;

    that being morally incapable of recovering the image of his Creator which was lost in Adam, every man is justly exposed to eternal damnation;

    * * * that God of his mere good pleasure elected some to everlasting life;

    and that he entered into a covenant of grace to deliver them out of this state of sin and misery by a Redeemer;

    that the only Redeemer of the elect is the eternal Son of God;

    * * * that the souls of believers are at their death made perfect in holiness and do immediately pass into glory; that their bodies, being still united to Christ, will at the resurrection, be raised up to glory; and

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    that the saints will be made perfectly blessed in the full enjoyment of God to all eternity;

    but that the wicked will awake to shame and everlasting contempt, and with devils, will be plunged into the lake that burneth with fire and brimstone forever and ever. * * *

    I moreover believe that God, according to the counsel of His own will, and for His own glory, hath foreordained whatsoever comes to pass;

    * * * that God's decrees perfectly consist with human liberty, God's universal agency with the agency of man, and man's dependence with his accountability. * * *

    "And, furthermore, I do solemnly promise that I will open and explain the Scriptures to my pupils with integrity and faithfulness;

    that I will maintain and inculcate the Christian faith as expressed in the creed by me now repeated, together with all the other doctrines and duties of our holy religion so far as may appertain to my office, according to the best light God shall give me;

    and in opposition not only to Atheists and Infidels, but to Jews, Mahometans, Arians, Pelagians, Antinomians, Arminians, Socinians, Unitarians and Universalists. * * *

    "The preceding declaration shall be repeated by every professor in the seminary, in the presence of the trustees, at the expiration of every successive period of five years;

    and no man shall be continued as president or professor in this institution who shall not continue to approve himself to the satisfaction of the trustees, a man of sound and orthodox principles in divinity, agreeably to the system of evangelical doctrines contained in the said Westminster Shorter Catechism, and more concisely delineated in the aforesaid Creed."

    These extracts are copied from the Laws of the Theological Institution in Andover printed at Andover by Gould & Newman, in 1837, one year before my entrance there. Nor had I openly dissented from any of these doctrines, as I understood them, when I left the Congregational church and its pulpit for the divine ministry of freedom, humanity and holiness.

    -87-


    (pp 88-99)

    has risen up among us;" and he immediately called him to order; adding, "I think I have the spirit of God. I am a Christian!"

    This, and the Haverhill and Littleton ministers already described, with the Hopkinton association of divines, were only true representatives of the great majority of the popular New England clergy of that day.

    Their plainness of speech well accorded with the rest. And besides, much larger bodies than the Hopkinton association, were alike audacious in utterance, as well.

    That campaign in northern New Hampshire, made in the autumn after the society secessions, separations and new organizations, fully convinced me, had other hopes been entertained before, that the church and its ministry would be found in very deed the "bulwarks," if not at last "the forlorn hope of slavery," in complete confirmation of the declarations of Hon. James G. Birney [1792-1857].

    It was no less plain, too, that very few of the abolitionists themselves were aware of the terrible contest before them; as many later withdrawals from their always scanty ranks proved.

    In a subsequent account rendered to the society through their paper, the Herald, I hazarded the prediction, that

    "before the fell demon of slavery should be cast out, there would be contortions, foamings and wallowings to rend our civil, social, and ecclesiastical organizations, in so much that many would say, 'They are dead.' For it is of a kind that goeth not out but by prayer and fasting.

    "Other foul spirits, too, will be discovered; their very name, legion. All the foundations of the great deep will be broken up.

    "On earth must be perplexity and distress of nations; the sea and the waves roaring, and the hearts of men failing them for fear,

    -100-

    and for looking at the things that are coming on the earth; for the powers of heaven shall be shaken."

    If our thirty years war of moral and peaceful agitation failed to fulfill all these prophecies, what shall be said of the subsequent four years war of rebellion, with all their frightful costs of blood and treasure? War, whose thunders shook the land, the sea, the skies! Whose reverberations still go sounding down towards the night of the nineteenth century!

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    CHAPTER VI.

    CONVENTIONS AND MEETINGS WITH MR. ROGERS
    AND MR. FOSTER—DIGRESSION ON
    NEW ORGANIZATION.

    New Hampshire continued my field of operations through 1840. Following the Grafton county campaign were two or three quite notable anti-slavery conventions, the best everyway, perhaps, at Milford, when all parts of Hillsboro county had representation. Mr. Garrison, Mr. Rogers, Mr. Foster, and some others were present to assist in the proceedings.

    The genius and spirit of our movement at that time may be gathered somewhat from the Resolutions generally, most thoroughly considered and usually adopted with few, if any, dissenting voices. At Milford the following passed after a searching and able discussion:

    Resolved, That slavery is a national, not a local, institution, and the whole people are involved in all its guilt, evils and dangers.

    Resolved, That the churches, rebuked by anti-slavery and pronounced unworthy the name of Christian, and the clergymen whom it declares unworthy of support as religious teachers, are those, and only those, who connive at the existence of American slavery, or refuse to bear faithful, public testimony against it.

    Resolved, That the anti-slavery society was originally constituted on principles of perfect equality and justice, and any attempt to change that construction, and to new organize it, is a departure from those principles and a practical betrayal of the cause of the slave.

    Milford was early an anti-slavery town. With such resolutions most ably discussed, and almost unanim-

    -102-

    ously adopted by a large congregation, the meeting was everyway a success. It commenced on Thanksgiving evening, with an opening address by Mr. Garrison, in the spacious and then new Congregational meeting-house, the minister, Mr. Warner, another Gilmanton classmatc of mine. Himself and church, however, were already far on the road to new organization. Those who remained faithful to the anti-slavery cause soon after withdrew from the church, and were henceforth known as comeouters, infidels, non-resistants, Garrisonians, or whatever other name, honorable or opprobrious, was fastened upon them and others like them.

    It may be worthy of mention that the Concord attendants drove over to Milford in two open carriages, leaving home early on Thanksgiving morning, in a cold November rain, from which umbrellas were a poor protection. But the joyous greeting and reception which awaited us at our half-way house, the hospitable and sumptuous home of the farmers, Luther and Lucinda Melendy, on Chestnut hill, in Amherst, very soon dispelled all memory of outside storms, or other exposure or inconvenience. Rogers, in his Herald account of the convention, said of this incident:

    We were received at the Melendys with the welcome which compensates for months of pro-slavery scowling round about our path of life. Cordiality and brotherly love adorned the face of the household—the bounties of the season, the hospitable board ; and the Bible, the Liberator, Herald of Freedom, and National Anti-Slavery Standard the reading table. Here were the circumstances and conditions of genuine anti-slavery. * * * We were obliged to leave the interesting .spot too soon. We reached Milford, brother and sister Melendy in company, just as friend Warner's meeting-house was lighted up for a

    -103-


    (pp 104-119)

    anti-slavery ministers among them all, told us to what purpose. "Let the individual fellowship of the churches be left to themselves," he said after cutting connexion with the larger ecclesiastical bodies. But even that to any effective extent, was never done.

    In 1842, Judge Birney revised and made more conclusive the argument in his work entitled "The American Churches, the Bulwarks of American Slavery;" himself a leading member and ruling elder of the Presbyterian church when the book was written.

    In 1844, appeared, "The Brotherhood of Thieves; or a True Picture of the American Church and Clergy," taking up the argument where Mr. Birney had left off, besides greatly strengthening his, by multiplied proofs from the same sources.

    In 1847, "The Church as It Is; the Forlorn Hope of Slavery," appeared, bringing the action of the churches and clergy on the slavery question down to that time.

    A peculiarity [characteristic] of all these books was, the churches and ministers furnished the testimony, so that they were judged by their own words and works.

    A division occurred in the general conference of the Methodist church. But the south, not the north, separated. And there still remained seven or eight annual conferences in the northern division, the boundaries distinctly discribed in the Book of Discipline.

    And on slavery the books of north and south read exactly alike, and it was shown clearly by Methodist testimony that there were still thousands of slave-holders and many thousand slaves in the northern general conference.

    The one unquestionable fact was, that though there were exceptions to the fearful charge, the system of slavery was supported by the government and sanctified by the religion of the nation, till the Infinite Patience could bear it no longer. The

    -120-

    trump of the avenging angel first sounded at Fort Sumter, summoning north and south to their judgment day.

    Nor could the dread call be resisted. At the memorable field of Bull Run the two armies met face to face. It was on a beautiful summer Sunday morning. The northern and the southern states, regiments of Baptists, Congregationalists, Methodists, Presbyterians, Episcopalians, from Maine to Michigan; regiments of the same denominations were up to meet them from the shores of the Mexican gulf to Mason and Dixon's line. Many of both armies must have sometime sat together at the sacramental supper-tables of the same denominational faith. But now their hour had come.

    Now the warnings, entreaties and expostulations of the faithful abolitionists were ended, and their terrible predictions were to be fulfilled. On that bright Sunday the two armies met in battle array. Avenging Justice beheld them, and seizing the one in His right hand the other in His left, dashed them together, dashed them in pieces, and gave frightful multitudes of them their last sacrament; not any more in the blood of slaves sold for wine of communion, but in the steaming battle blood of each other!

    For days both sides claimed a victory. The rebel commander-in-chief sent to his congress at Richmond forthwith dispatches dated Sunday night, and commencing thus:

    "The night has closed upon a hard fought field.

    "The enemy were routed, and precipitately fled, abandoning a large amount of arms, knapsacks and baggage.

    "The ground was strewn for miles with those killed, and the farm-houses and grounds around were filled with the wounded.

    "Pursuit was continued along several routes till darkness covered the fugitives."

    -121-

    Let readers mark those words, "the fugitives." New England, Boston even, had many noble sons in that fight; and only a little while before New England, and even Boston, was returning fugitive slaws to their masters. Who was He who once said,

    "With what measure ye meet, it shall be measured to you again?" [Matt. 7:2; Mk. 4:24; Lk. 6:38]
    And what the Boston pulpit, what Andover Theological Seminary said, what nearly every evangelical doctor of divinity taught on the duty of returning fugitive slaves, shall be shown in some future chapter of these fearful chronicles.

    -122-
    CHAPTER VII.

    ACTS CONTINUED, WITH PERSONAL SKETCH
    OF STEPHEN SYMONDS FOSTER.

    The last chapter contained an account of a sally into the lecturing field in which Mr. Foster and myself were accompanied by our inestimable coadjutor, Mr. Rogers, of the Herald of Freedom.

    My next campaign was with Foster alone, and as some account of Mr. Garrison and Mr. Rogers has been given, it may be proper to advert briefly to some of the more general incidents in the early life of Stephen S. Foster.

    It has been already intimated that in this work only the acts of a small number of the anti-slavery apostles can be even named. There were many, both men and women, whose separate faithful labors, patient endurance of privations, perils, sacrifices and sufferings, earned for each one a volume larger and abler than this can possibly be. Men and women whose very names should only be spoken by those of cleanest lips and purest hearts.

    Mr. Foster was born in Canterbury, New Hampshire, in November, 1809, son of Colonel Asa Foster, of revolutionary days. He was the ninth child of a family of thirteen.

    The old Foster homestead is in the north part of Canterbury, on a beautiful hillside, overlooking a long stretch of the Merrimack river valley, including Concord, and a wide view east and west, as well as south. It includes several hundred acres, and is still owned by one of the Foster brothers.

    -123-

    Stephen left it early and learned the trade of a carpenter and builder. In that, however, he did not come to his life occupation. His parents were most devout and exemplary members of the Congregational church, to which he also was joined in youthful years.

    At that time the call for ministers and missionaries, especially to occupy the new opening field at the west, called then "the great valley of the Mississippi," was loud and earnest. At twenty-two [c. 1831] he heard and heeded it, and immediately entered on a course of collegiate study to that end, and it is only just to say that a more consistent, conscientious, divinely consecrated spirit never set itself to prepare for that then counted holiest of callings.

    Though assenting to the creed and covenant of his denomination, his whole rule of practical life and work was the "Sermon on the Mount [Matt. 5:3-7:27]," as interpreted and illustrated in the life and death of its author.

    With him "Love your enemies" [Matt. 5:44] was more than words, and "Resist not evil" [Matt. 5:39]was not returning evil, nor inflicting penalties under human enactments. And he went early to prison for non-appearance at military parade, armed with weapons of death.

    In Dartmouth College he was called to perform military service. On christian principles he declined, and was arrested and dragged away to jail. So bad were the roads that a part of the way the sheriff was compelled to ask him to leave the carriage and walk. He would cheerfully have walked all the way, as once did George Fox [1624-1691], good naturedly telling the officer, "Thee need not go thyself; send thy boy, I know the way;" for Foster feared no prison cells. He had earnest work in hand which led through many of them in subsequent years.

    -124-

    Eternal Goodness might have had objects in view in sending him to Haverhill, for he found the jail in a condition to demand the hand of a Hercules, as in the "Augæan" stables for its cleansing. His companions there were poor debtors, as well as thieves, murderers, and lesser felons. One man so gained his confidence as to whisper in his ear that on his hands was the blood of murder, though none knew it but himself. Another poor wretch had been so long confined by illness to his miserable bed, that it literally swarmed with vermin crawling from his putrid sores.

    Foster wrote and sent to the world such a letter as few but he could write, awakening general horror and indignation wherever it was read, and a cleansing operation was forthwith instituted. The filth on the floor was found so deep and so hard trodden, that strong men had to come with pick-axes and dig it up. And that jail was not only revolutionized, but the whole prison system of the state from that time began to be reformed; and imprisonment for debt was soon heard of here no more.

    His college studies closed, he entered, for a theological course, the Union Seminary in New York. Soon aftenward there was threatened war between our country and Great Britain, over a short stretch of the northeastern boundary line, about which the two nations had disputed for half a century. Wholly opposed to war as was he, for any cause, he and a few of his friends proposed a meeting for prayer and conference, in relation to it as then menaced. Foster asked for the use of a lecture room for their purpose, but was surprised as much as grieved to find the seminary faculty not only opposed to granting the use of the room, but sternly against the holding of any such meeting.

    -125-

    That refusal, probably more than any other one event, determined his whole future course. For while in college he had had many serious doubts and misgivings as to the claim of the great body of the American church and clergy to the Christian name and character; not only because of their supporting war and approval of his incarceration for peace principles, but also for their persistent countenance of slave-holding and fellowship of even slave-breeders and slave-holders, as Christians and Christian ministers.

    In 1839, Mr. Foster abandoned all hope of the Congregational ministry, and entered the anti-slavery service, side by side with Garrison, of the Boston Liberator, and Nathaniel Peabody Rogers, of the New Hampshire Herald of Freedom. And from that time onward till slavery was abolished, and indeed to the day of his death, the cause of freedom and humanity, justice and truth, had no more faithful, few if any more able champions.

    In the autumn of 1845, he married Miss Abby Kelley, of Worcester, Massachusetts, then a well and widely-known lecturer on anti-slavery, temperance, peace, and other subjects pertaining to the rights and the welfare of man and womankind. She and a daughter, their only child, survive him. The daughter graduated first at Vassar College, then entered Cornell University, which she left at the end of the year, with the degree of Master of Arts.

    I first saw Stephen Foster in the autumn of 1834. We were commencing teaching schools in adjoining districts of a small country town. A "revival of religion" soon appeared in the town, and was eminently powerful in his school, if, indeed, it did not commence there. His school was much larger than mine, and many of the parents were members, and

    -126-

    some of them officers, of the Congregational church. They found in Mr. Foster a teacher, or at any rate a leader in religion, as well as in the literature of their school. And though most satisfactory progress was made in all the branches, and the discipline of the school was deemed throughout of the very best, nearly every scholar of or above fifteen years old was converted and joined the Congregational church; and then their teacher and some of themselves came over as missionaries into my more remote and benighted district, and quite a work was accomplished there.

    The venerable minister of the town thought, and from the standpoint, and in the light of that day, thought truly, that, "with young Mr. Foster, evidently, was 'the secret of the Lord!'" And that same characteristic faithfulness he brought with him into the anti-slavery cause. And soon learning where was the great, deep, tap-root of the deadly upas, he laid the axe at the root of the tree.

    His encounters with the church and ministry, the frequency with which his meetings had been and were still broken up by brutal mobs, not unfrequently justified by the pulpit and religious press, had made him a disciple to the Birney doctrine, "The American Churches the Bulwarks of American Slavery," long before this startling tract had come before the public.

    Mr. Birney's experiences with the same power suggested his title; but a few years later, another pamphlet appeared from Foster's own pen, entitled, "The Brotherhood of Thieves; or a True Picture of the American Church and Clergy." Mr. Birney had already proved the pertinence and propriety of such a title in his little work; but in a ringing book, of more than seventy pages, Foster showed, by super-abundant testimony, and every single witness furnished by the

    -127-

    church itself, that if slavery were man stealing, as the Presbyterian church had declared it forty years before, and "the highest kind of theft," then surely the whole southern church was indeed a vast "Brotherhood of Thieves!" with their northern baptized brethren, who fellowshiped them as Christians, their not less guilty accomplices!

          Mr. Foster therefore made the popular, prevailing religions his main point of attack. What could he have done otherwise? The churches of the north were opened to southern slave-breeders, slave-traders, slave-hunters, and slave-holders, if members of the same, and often even of widely different denominations, both for preaching, baptizing and sacramental supper occasions and purposes.

          There were a few exceptions; but not enough to affect the general charge. Northern academies, colleges, universities, and theological seminaries, toned down their whole curriculum of moral and religious training and teaching to suit the depraved demand and taste of the whole brotherhood of southern slave-holders. And with most rare exceptions, the northern press attuned itself to the same key.

          The religious public soon learned to dread Mr. Foster's presence or approach. Convicted of the most malignant pro-slaveryism, and by its own public records and reports of proceedings of ecclesiastical bodies and associations, from general assemblies, general conferences, and American Bible, missionary and tract societies, to state and county conferences and consociations, they had good reason to fear such a judgment-day before the time.

    So there was a conspiracy among all classes of the people to conquer the abolitionists, "by letting them severely alone." And in some states the clergy went

    -128-

    so far as to issue pastoral letters to the churches, declaring that anti-slavery lecturers had no right to invade a people who had chosen a pastor and regularly inducted him into office; nor had such a people any right to permit it. A Massachusetts clerical mandate, duly published in the religious papers, signed by two congregational ministers, contained this paragraph:

    "When a people have chosen a pastor, and he has been regularly inducted into office, they have so far surrendered up to him the right to discharge the appropriate duties of his office in the parish over which he is settled, that they themselves can not send another to discharge those duties, all or any part of them, against his wishes, without an evident invasion of his territory. Whoever comes before a parish under these circumstances is an intruder.

    "And equally so is he who, after being admitted by the pastor, sets up his judgment in matter that falls properly under the pastor's control. These are both acts of trespass, and the perpetrators of them are or should be liable to ecclesiastical censure. The unfaithfulness or incapacity of the pastor is no apology for the offence."

    Nor was this law a dead letter in any place where it could possibly be enforced, whether in Massachusetts or anywhere in the north or west.

    But the brave faithfulness of Mr. Foster to the enslaved and to his own solemn convictions, soon triumphed over such religious despotism. He conceived the idea of entering the meeting houses on Sunday, and at the hour of sermon, respectfully rising and claiming the right to be heard then and there, on the duties and obligations of the church to those who were in bonds at the south.

    This measure he first adopted in the old North church, at Concord, in September, 1841. He was immediately seized by "three young gentlemen, one a southerner from Alabama, and the other two, guards

    -129-


    (pp 130-141)

    better that they had been all given in the same manner and continued, in this extract. Almost all the parties, official and unofficial, are now dead; many of them died long ago, even those who led the mob outrages at the church door where Foster received his bodily injuries. The court room during the trial, which lasted through the most of an afternoon, was crowded with an audience whose sympathies at the beginning were doubtless quite evenly divided, for Concord was at that time by no means an anti-slavery town.

    But when the complaint was read, solemnly charging the accused, who was a well-known, consistent peace man and non-resistant, with "force and arms," and "rude and indecent behavior," the whole scene assumed a ludicrous aspect only. As the trial proceeded, however, it soon became manifest that malice and spite instigated the arrest, and that summary vengeance was to be inflicted, however unjust.

    Then when Foster so serenely corrected the court in its knowledge of law, telling just when the law was repealed, and where, and at whose desire, and exactly for what purpose the law then existing to protect public religious meetings was enacted, all of which he showed to the full satisfaction of the court, the burst of admiring applause was as general and hearty as it was long continued. Nor was there any attempt to suppress it. That was the verdict of humanity and justice, instinctively rendered, with voice and power irresistible.

    And when Judge Badger remitted the fine, which doubtless gave him great pleasure, though he transcended his authority in doing so, there was another demonstration of delight, at which Sheriff Pettingill stepped forward and told him he would remit his fees with the fine, and take nothing for his services. To

    -142-

    which the judge good naturedly responded that he would not be outdone in magnanimity, and would throw in his charges with the rest, and Mr. Foster might be discharged. The demonstration which succeeded needs no description, no report.

    But there was yet one more incident worthy of mention. Judge Badger beholding the generous pile of silver which had been tossed on his table, asked, "What shall be done with all this money?" "Give it to Foster, give it to Foster," was shouted out from all over the yet crowded room. Carried by acclamation. It was done. Sheriff Pettingill then gave Foster his hand and said, "Now if you will step into my carriage I will be very happy to take you back to your lodgings." The offer was cordially and gratefully accepted by our weary and suffering friend, and thus ended the day with its strange and wondrous disclosures and deeds.

    But perhaps narration should not close without a brief mention of two or three meetings held immediately, to consider the right and propriety of so liberal construction of the rights of speech and worship, as were attempted by Mr. Foster and countenanced by Mr. Wood. Both being members of the state anti-slavery executive committee, that committee united with them in a formal call for such expression.

    And a committee was appointed to extend a special invitation to the clergy of the town to attend and participate in the deliberations. But the clergy did not come, though the people did, in number and quality, too, much to their surprise. Mr. Foster vindicated himself in the course he pursued, by the example of Jesus Christ and his apostles, who were both dragged out of the synagogues by the church and clergy of their time. He showed that Christ enjoined on his

    -143-


    (pp 144-153)

    rough, so that when we arrived it was time to commence, and a good audience had assembled, some from several miles away.

    The days were at the shortest, and we were to hold an evening meeting, so that there was not much time to be lost. It was quite sunset when we closed.

    A Mr. Sanborn came and said we had better go home with him to supper, as probably no other family would invite us, and there was no tavern in the town. He told us he and his family were anti-slavery, and kept to the old organization, and would be extremely glad to entertain us, though he lived two miles away, and up the mountain besides.

    And he also said, and much to my joy, that we need not take our horse out in the evening, as we could be brought back in the family wagon.

    "Catamount hill," as it was and is called, proved to us the "Delectable mountains" of Bunyan's pilgrims.

    We had two interesting meetings, but New Organisation had preceded us and captured the church and minister, so that those who aided us there, as elsewhere, with hospitality, with sympathy, or otherwise, were outside of the sectarian folds.

    The experiences of Monday and Tuesday were a fair average of the experiences of the week, for we reached Concord on Monday, having been absent eight days; and we had held one or two meetings every day. A snow storm came in the time, and we were compelled to have our Tunbridge winter shod in consequence.

    We had had some success in disposing of our shares to the debt, but beyond that our financial operations would not to-day be pronounced a success.

    On reckoning up we had exactly thirty-seven cents more than when we set out, and that was in my hands. I did not smile if Foster did, when he said: "Well, Parker, I have no wife and you have; so this time we will not divide." Nor prob-

    -154-

    ably did my wife smile heartily when I reached home and disclosed to her the situation. We made our supper of plain coarse bread and butter.

    But next morning, to my wonderment, we had just the same for breakfast. In a joking way I complained of her fare, and said something about a new boarding house unless she set a better table. The wit was a little too cool and deposited a dew drop or two in her eye and down her cheek, as she told me her money was out, and she did not like to break our resolution, never to be in debt.

    It would have been in order then for my eye to reflect back her's, but a rainbow in her sky seemed to me just then the needed return.

    It was true we determined in our little forty dollars a year rent never to be in debt; but her health then was not as robust as mine. Such a breakfast was soon dispatched, and nearly as soon I was on the street to break our good resolution, if there was strength in my credit to do it.

    Mr. Franklin Evans then (as I believe ever since) kept an excellent general country store, and readily consented to trust me for whatever was needed.

    When I asked for my first and costliest article, which was fourteen pounds of good flour, he advised my taking a half barrel, as more economical. But I declined his generous proposal, and kept my bill within three dollars, though some nice butter and sugar were in my purchase. Before bed-time three dollars came from some unexpected source, with which the debt was paid as promised, and wife and I slept that night as before from our marriage, "owing no man anything, but to love one another."

    And it is only truth and justice to say that from that night, the handful of meal and cruse of oil never wholly failed our humble home.

    -155-

    CHAPTER VIII.

    ACTS OF THE APOSTLES CONTINUED—LETTER OF
    CONCORD WOMEN—CLERICAL USURPATION—MORE
    REVELATIONS OF NEW ORGANIZATION—RIOTOUS
    PROCEEDINGS AT DOVER—BY THE
    EDITOR OF THE HERALD OF FREEDOM.

    As we are now back in Concord, we will once more recur briefly to the South church. Readers doubtless have seen, if not deplored, some repetition in previous chapters—only necessary till they become acquainted with the persons and the principles mostly presented in these pages for their consideration.

    It is now proposed to present a new phase of anti-slavery action and effort, in which all could bear active part who chose. Concord South Congregational church had several excellent men and women, who had made themselves quite offensive to the minister and some prominent members by their fidelity to the anti-slavery cause. Some had even withdrawn, both from communion supper service and Sunday worship. Some were women who were denied all speech or prayer, in private as well as public assemblies. They addressed a formal communication to the church, expressive of their views and determinations, and then withdrew wholly from such fellowship..

    And in presenting that letter here it should be said that the same course became common, if not general, among genuine abolitionists all over the country, until the sect known as Come-outers grew to be numerous, and odious, too, to all who lacked courage or honesty to imitate that entirely scriptural course. Great numbers of these church withdrawal letters are before

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    me in the bound volumes of anti-slavery papers, some of them of diamond points; those of Mr. and Mrs. Rogers among them.

    New organized and third political party abolitionists displayed most fiery zeal at the ballot box once or twice a year; would vote for no whig nor democrat to fill the meanest office.

    At the baptismal and sacramental altar whig and democrat shrunk into "gnats," and were swallowed in the communion wine, who, on Monday at the polls, swelled into larger "camels" than ever were exhibited at Barnum's menagerie.

    Not so the women, nor some of the husbands of the women who addressed the subjoined

    Letter to the South Congregational church in Concord,
    under the pastoral care of Daniel J. Noyes:
    DEAR BRETHREN AND SISTERS:—We, the undersigned, members of the South Congregational church in this town, feel bound in duty to God and man to address to you the following communication:

    Three millions of our fellow beings are living in our midst under the following circumstances:

    • The family institution is abolished among them—husbands and wives, parents and children, are torn asunder to gratify the cupidity of their oppressors;

    • they are punished as felons for any attempt to learn to read the Holy Gospel;

    • parents are liable to be scourged and punished with death for teaching their children the way of life and salvation by Jesus Christ.

    • Eight thousand children are annually stolen, labeled as property and converted into merchandize.

    • One sixth of the population of this nation are driven to incessant and unrequited toil from the dawn of life to its close.

    • Three millions of God's immortal children, our brethren and sisters, are held and used among us as chattels personal, and bought and sold as brute beasts.

    • [White] Parents not unfrequently sell their own children [by slave women].

    • Thus a cloud of frightful, perpetual night is drawn over millions of souls in this land of Bibles and professed Christian ministers and churches
    .

    -157-


    (pp 158-179)

    Root. Nor was his church as a body, far behind him. Nor was he by any means among the first, nor most active in the clerical conspiracy which led or drove to the division and new organisation.

    Had northern clerical cooperation and church participation in all the crimes, cruelties and damning guilt of slavery never been arraigned, Dover had never had a mob in defence of such partnership in the sin.

    Had Mr. Root remained the minister of that church, it is hardly probable that scenes so disgraceful would have been witnessed.

    But Mr. Root had left Dover and New Hampshire, and the Rev. Mr. Young was in his stead straight from the sombre shades of Andover Theological Seminary. It was a large, rich church and society that had settled and ordained him, and they worshipped in one of the largest and finest meeting houses then in the state.

    Some of us who were with Mr. Young at Andover rather wondered at their selection to succeed such a man as David Root. But so it was, though his stay in Dover was short, and he early abandoned thé ministry altogether.

    The mob of that dark December night was precipitated by the arraignment of Rev. Edwin Holt, of Portsmouth, as a slaveholder. And yet Mr. Young knew the charge was true. He admitted it to Mr. Rogers at the very steps of the altar, before the tumult had wholly ceased. His church must have known it was true.

    And Mr. Holt knew that Mr. Young knew it was true, because Mr. Young told us that Mr. Holt knew what his opinion of the business was, and he gave us to understand, doubtless intended that we should understand, that he had dealt very faithfully with him, as an offending brother. Why, then, did he cry havoc, and let slip the dogs of war on our meeting for free and friendly discussion? A

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    meeting, as were all the meetings we ever held, free alike to our foes and friends.

    A meeting in which Mr. Young or Mr. Cogswell, or Mr. Pierce, could have had half of every hour, and more, had he desired, to contradict or disprove any statement of ours, about Mr. Holt, or anybody, or anything else.

    But the truth was, there was nothing to contradict. We knew whereof we affirmed. That was no new scene to us.

    On that very night, Foster had on a coat, (a dress coat of the style of that time), one skirt of which was torn square off in a violent mob at Portland, only the week before, and which coat he wore for weeks afterward, as a testimony against Portland christianity, though his friends very soon furnished him another.

    No, it is not very likely we could be convicted of false statements in the face of two or three mobs in a week. For we were not courting persecution. We were not ambitions for martyr honors, nor confessors' crowns. But we spoke the truth, and if not the whole truth, certainly nothing but the truth in the love of God and man. And we could not often be successfully contradicted, as most who heard us knew full well.

    Mr. Young was not countenanced by all his congregation in his strange and unwarrantable course on that occasion. Indeed, he was quite sharply, though good-naturedly rebuked by one parishioner as we groped our way out in the total darkness. He happened, unfortunately, to tell us what we could not mistake, that it was very dark. Then responded his parishioner, who could hear but not see him,

    "True, Brother Young, but it is about as light as you ever make it for us."

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    CHAPTER IX.

    MEETINGS IN WEST CHESTER—-RIOTOUS AND SHAMEFUL
    CONDUCT—RIDE TO DERRY, AND WHAT CAME OF IT—
    FRANKL1N MOB DESCRIBED IN LETTER BY MR. FOSTER.

    That the churches were indeed the bulwarks of slavery grew every day more and more apparent. And as Dover, and several other of the larger towns have testified, it may be proper to report briefly on a few of the smaller places we visited, such as Auburn, Chester, and Derry. Auburn was at that time known as West Chester. Its church was Presbyterian, its minister, Rev. Benjamin Sargent, already introduced in these pages, venerable in years and rich in the graces of the true Christian minister and man of that period.

    The Methodists had a strong hold in West Chester, but at the center of the town, Congregationalism held undisputed sway and ruled with rigor not often surpassed. No town ever more sternly or successfully resisted the anti-slavery, or other unpopular reforms.

    In conversation with a venerable deacon of the church on the Indian question, so prominent at the time of the Scminole war, he declared to me that it was the duty of the first settlers of the country to exterminate the Indian tribes as completely as did the Israelites the inhabitants of Canaan and of Midian; "killing everything that breathed." He said all our Indian wars ever since were God's judgments, sent as penalty for neglecting that duty! And, moreover, that they would be inflicted till that duty was done.

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    He seemed exactly of the spirit of some Connecticut colonists, who, it was told, seized the territory under two resolutions, unanimously adopted:
    "I. Resolved—That the earth is to be given to the saints as an inheritance forever. And

    II. Resolved—That we, being saints, do hereby take possession of that portion of it bounded as follows, etc., etc."

    I never heard that the Chester Congregational church, or its deacons, or minister, held ever afterwards any more humane sentiment towards the Indians, or even the slaves, while slavery lasted.

    Our first anti-slavery meeting at West Chester was held in the Methodist meeting-house—adjourned there from the school-house, which was too small for half who came, the evening being Sunday.

    Most of the time was occupied by Mr. Foster, who paid the Methodists, who were present in large numbers, the compliment of presuming that they wished to know the exact truth as to their connection with slavery, that they might be governed accordingly. So he opened Judge Birney's tract and proceeded to read exactly the record the denomination had furnished for itself in the past as far back as 1780; when it was

    "Resolved, That the conference acknowledges slavery contrary to the laws of God, man and nature; and hurtful to society; contrary to the dictates of conscience and true religion."

    In 1784, when the Methodist church had been fully organized, rules were adopted fixing the time when members who were already slaveholders should emancipate all their slaves, and then followed this solemn injunction:

    "Every person concerned, who will not comply with these rules, shall have liberty quietly to withdraw"

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    from our society within the twelve months following the notice being given him as aforesaid. Otherwise, the assistants shall exclude him from the society. No person holding slaves shall be admitted into our society or to the Lord's supper till he comply with these rules concerning slavery. And those who buy, sell or give away slaves, unless on purpose to free them, shall be immediately expelled."

    And then, again, in 1801, the conference declared:

    "We declare that we are more than ever convinced of the great evils of African slavery, which still exists in these United States. * * * * * Every member of the society who sells a slave shall, immediately after full proof, be excluded. * * * * * Proper committees shall be appointed by the annual conferences out of the most respectable of our friends, for the conducting of the business. And the presiding elders, deacons, and traveling preachers shall procure as many proper signatures as possible to the addresses: and give all the assistance in their power in every respect to aid the committees and to further the blessed undertaking. Let this be continued from year to year, till the desired end be accomplished."

    So much, and more of the same character, Mr. Foster had in hand to read to the Methodists who on that evening composed a large proportion of our numerous audience. And so much he read to the credit of early Methodism. But then he had to unfold and expose the terrible degeneracy and apostacy in a single generation. And this was his offence, though his testimony was still as before only what the denomination itself furnished him.

    In the year 1836 the general conference was held in Cincinnati, Ohio, and adopted with only fourteen dissenting voices this resolution:

    "Resolved, By the delegates of the annual conferences in general conference assembled, that we are decidedly opposed to modern abolitionism; and wholly

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    disclaim any right, wish, or intention to interfere in the civil and political relation between master and slave as it exists in the slave holding states of this Union."

    And this resolution, though ample to the purpose of Foster, was a small part of the stunning testimony he presented to show that the northern Methodists were fully as guilty as their southern brethren of all the abominations of slave holding. For instance, he cited the declarations of the most eminent northern ministers and doctors of Methodist divinity. Rev. Dr. [Wilbur] Fisk, president of the Wesleyan university of Connecticut, said and published to this effect:

    "The relation of master and slave may, and does, exist in many cases, under such circumstances as free the master from the just charge and guilt of immorality. The text, 1 Cor., 7th chap., 20 to 23d verse, seems mainly to enjoin and sanction the fitting continuance of their present social relations. The free man was to remain free, and the slave, unless emancipation should offer, was to remain a slave. The general rule of Christianity, not only permits, but ini supposable cases, enjoins a continuance of the master's authority. The New Testament enjoins obedience upon the slave, as an obligation due to rightful authority." [Ed. Note: H. B. Stowe showed that there are no masters, only kidnappers.]

    Only so much from a great deal by Dr. Fisk, in like vein and tone. And this one baptismal seal by Bishop [Elijah] Hedding, then living in Lynn, Massachusetts, as read in the Christian Advocate and Journal:

    "The right to hold a slave is founded on this rule: 'Therefore, all things whatsoever ye would that men should do unto you, do ye even so to them, for this is the law and the prophets.'"

    The argument of Mr. Foster enraged, as much as surprised, the Methodist portion of the audience. He showed slavery to be wholesale adultery and concubinage, and that all, who upheld it by fellowshipping it

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    as Christians, or fit to be regarded with anything less than abhorrence and execration, were partakers in those sins and shames [contrary to Ephesians 5:7,   1 Timothy 5:22,   John 17:15,   2 Corinthians 6:14-18, and Revelation 18:4]. He proved, that Methodist church members and ministers had held, or still held hundreds of thousands of slaves, while pretending to detest slavery and to be seeking its overthrow; holding them as "goods and chattels," robbing them of marriage, and dooming them to perpetual prostitution, till the southern Methodist church had made itself a great house of ill-fame, a vast brothel, into which the Son of God himself, in the person of his forlorn brethren and sisters, was continually and hopelessly cast!

    He declared no house of ill-fame in New York was guilty of such fearful impiety, such frightful abomination. For there the victim or the guilty could flee out and escape, while in the churches they were held, were compelled by both religion and government, to stay and endure, even though their soul and spirit were pure as the angels of God!

    Mr. Foster was heard an hour or more with comparative order and attention. Suddenly a man rose in great agitation, much as a drunken man or lunatic some times did in our meetings, and demanded proof of what had been said. Nothing needed proving, as the church and clergy supplied all the argument, and the inferences were as self-evident as heat from fire, or light from the heavens. But instead of drunkard or lunatic, the man proved to be one of the leading members of that very church, and it required the aid of some of his brethren to quiet him and restore the order of the meeting. Foster then opened the Bible and read the eighteenth chapter of Revelation down to the thirteenth verse, and sat down, leaving the remaining time to me.

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    The verse [Revelation 18:4] containing the injunction: "Come out of her, my people, that ye be not partakers of her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues," read in Mr. Foster's deep, earnest, solemn tones, produced a deep impression; and a man rose with much apparent sincerity and asked: "Would it not be better to remain in the churches and reform them?" He, too, was a Methodist brother and, we were told, was a reformed inebriate. Had I known that at the time, I should have asked him whether dram-shops and brothels were fit haunts for those who had abandoned them, even to save the still lost ones, when everything and more could be done, and better done, from the outside? and especially if remaining within, or going within, involved eating of the same loaf and drinking the same cup with the guilty. [Ed. Note: See also Rev. John G. Fee's 1849 book saying likewise.]

    But as it was, I asked why Wesley did not remain in the old Episcopal church? Why not so preach his doctrine as not to create schism and separation? I asked if Unitarians or Universalists were ever exhorted to remain in their communion and work reform there, instead of coming out and uniting with the more evangelical churches into whose faith they had been converted.

    On the question of changing their religious preferences or beliefs, by leaving their pro-slavery communions to become abolitionists, I remarked that no such change would be required. I said, do you wish or prefer to be a Methodist? Then be a Methodist with all your heart; be such a Methodist as was Wesley who declared slavery "the sum of all villanies," which must brand a slave-holder as the sum of all villains; such a Methodist as was Dr. Adam Clarke [1762-1832], your own great Bible Commentator, who said and wrote:

    "If one place in hell is hotter than any other, that place should be appropriated to slave-holders."
    To

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    (pp 188-201)

    But the mob were not yet satisfied. They had not fully vindicated their character nor that of the church and ministry from the slanderous accusations of the anti-alavery agents.

    After the lapse of about three-quarters of an hour, most of the rioters retired from the hall. Joined, as we supposed, by a new recruit from the bar-room, they soon came back and commenced a hideous noise in the entry, which entirely overpowered the speaker's voice, and gave signs of another brutal assault.

    Several persons, not abolitionists, attempted to hush the noise, but to little purpose.

    One of them called upon the constable to take the leaders into custody, but he declined on the ground that he had no precept.

    I took occasion to remind this scrupulously conscientious political "minister of God" that when I entered your meeting-house for the purpose of preaching the gospel in an orderly manner, it was not thought necessary to obtain a precept in order to dispose of me; but that any member of the congregation who chose, the minister himself not excepted, turned constable and thrust me from the house.

    Finding it impossible to proceed with our exercises, brother Pillsbury and myself felt it our duty to shake off the dust of our feet and leave the place. This we did by a short, though solemn testimony, against all those through whose agency the meeting had been broken up.

    While recording that testimony, a death-like silence pervaded the room. Even the infuriated ranks of the besotted rioters that were momentarily threatening to break forth upon us, were overpowered by its fearful import, and they silently retired in dismay at the terrors of the coming judgment, leaving us to return in safety and unmolested to our lodgings.

    Such are the prominent facts connected with this disgraceful outrage. It only remains for me to submit the question whether, in view of them, I am not fully justified in the opinion that you were the guilty author.

    What possible interest had Mr. Hilton and his associates in the breaking up of our meeting? The anti slavery enterprise does not and cannot molest them. They have nothing to fear from the prevalence of free principles. The mob was on your be-

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    half. Its avowed object was to defend your character, and that of the church and ministry generally, against what it professed to regard as the slanderous accusations of the abolitionists.

    Ed. Note: List:
  • Adultery
  • Lust
  • Man-stealing
  • Murder
  • Piracy
  • Theft
  • Villanies
  • How is it, sir, that the bar-room has disgorged itself to furnish a body-guard for the pulpit? Why are the most vicious of your citizens so jealous of your reputation?

    Can we suppose that they acted contrary to your wishes in this matter? Men may oppose, but will rarely defend us by means which we do not sanction and approve.

    You declared you "would sooner co-operate with fiends from perdition than with Rogers and his coadjutors!"

    Is not this mob alarming proof that you are co-operating with fiends from perdition in the perpetuity of slavery, and not with Rogers and his coadjutors in its overthrow?

    Respectfully yours,

    STEPHEN S. FOSTER.
    Andover, Mass. Nov. 7, 1841.

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    CHAPTER X.

    DARTMOUTH COLLEEGE—RIOTOUS BEHAVIOR OF THE
    STUDENTS—STRAFFORD COUNTY ANNIVERSARY—
    EASTERN RAILROAD AND ITS JIM CROW CARS—
    OUTRAGES ON COLORED PASSENGERS.

    Franklin was but a specimen of New Hampshire, and Mr. Knight was in immense majority, and Dartmouth college was helping to keep the number of his kind good, if not increase it. At Franklin, the rioters were mostly boys, set on or led on by some old enough to be their fathers and grandfathers, drunk on rum or rage, spleen and spite, but doing the will and pleasure of church and minister. Their ribaldry was as offensive as their blasphemy.

    What we most feared, had most reason to fear, was that some indiscreet friend of ours might be impelled to resist their outrages of word and deed by force. True, the provocation was very great. But had such resistance been made, even to a single blow, however slight, it would have filled the hordes surrounding us with fiendish delight, and bloody scenes must inevitably have followed. Since the war of the rebellion, almost every ruffian appears to be armed with dirk, pistol, or both, ready for use at any moment. It was not so then and there, but I long kept in my cabinet stones and other missiles, including heavy bullets, which had been hurled at me and my brave companion, through windows, or as we walked or rode along the streets to or from our meetings.

    We read in New Testament times of a Stephen [Acts 7:58-59] stoned to death by a mob. I traveled and worked

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    with another Stephen who would have cheerfully suffered similar fate. And who shall say it would not have been in an equally holy cause? And in deep humility and sincerity I can say we together passed through many scenes where it would have been our joy, and true honor, too, to fall as did the ancient Stephen, could our cause have been best subserved thereby. But it was only in extreme peril that my constitutional cowardice was so far overcome. Mob violence was ever my aversion and dread, till deep in the midst of it. Brave old military heroes have often told me that they trembled at the outset, and till after the first few shots had been exchanged. Then there was no more fear. I could well understand them. But not so my friend Foster. He seemed ever cool and serene, before and through the fiercest encounters. Nor did any one ever see him exultant, in his most brilliant successes. But to return to our narrative.

    The next experiences and their results to be described occurred, soon after at Dartmouth college, which introduced me to society and scenes unknown before.

    The question has often been asked me, sometimes in letters from distant states, at what college I received my education. It always sounded strangely in my ears, when remembering that at seven and twenty there was not a harder worked, nor working man, young nor old, in my native state of Massachusetts, nor my involuntarily adopted state of New Hampshire, at four years old. At twenty-four, I joined the Congregational church, in Henniker. To me, it was the most sacred, solemn step of my whole life. There had been none of those dark, despairing convictions, so frequently felt and described, and still less had

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    there been any of the raptures, the "joy unspeakable and full of glory," that so many experienced, and even loudly boasted. I waited for such, long, earnestly, expectantly, and confidently.

    A doubt that such were necessary had not entered my mind, though many around me gave sad evidence in their lives and conversation after their experience, that even the most intense anguish of conviction and exttaic joy in the hour of conversion, were no assurance of regeneration or change of heart.

    The reasonableness, wisdom and righteousness of the divine requirements were made so plain to my understanding, and the observance of them, according to my enlightenment, so necessary to the highest happiness and welfare of the human race, that in the very love of them, I accepted them, irrespective of all questions of perdition as penalty or paradise as reward.

    Educated almost from infancy in the Congregational Sunday-school, and corresponding religious teaching with scrupulous care and faithfulness at home, it was easy to assume as true all the doctrines of our denomination, trinity atonement, total depravity and election, as well as everlasting rewards and retributions.

    If away beyond my comprehension, I remembered how many great and holy men had embraced and defended them; how many godly men and women had died martyrs for them on torturing racks and in burning flames, and who in my situation could doubt their truth without violence to every pulsation of soul and spirit?

    And so I entered the church tremblingly, but resolved to the best of all I was, or could become, to adorn my profession. And whatever duties were taught me as a Christian professer, I endeavored to perform.

    Temperance and anti-slavery were among my first espousals; the former with the approval of

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    and encouragement of our pastor, but the latter rather in spite of him.

    Our first anti-slavery lecture was delivered in the Methodist meeting-house, by Moses A. Cartland, then a most excellent Quaker school-teacher and principal, if not founder, of the once well-known Clinton Grove school, in the adjoining town of Weare. It was in the spring of 1835, while I was yet with my father and family on the farm.

    The lecture was a calm, serene, but truthful and faithful presentation of the wrongs of the slave, the crimes and cruelties, the outrages and abominations inseparable from the slave system; but all delivered with the gentleness and spirit of Lydia Maria Child, from whose writings he frequently and liberally quoted, and several older members of the church than myself were deeply impressed by the important truths we heard.

    Not so, however, the minister and most of the leading church members and officers. A general town meeting was called at the town house, and speeches were made and resolutions adopted denouncing and condemning the anti-slavery agitation and all who abetted or encouraged it. And similar meetings were held in many towns all over the state, and their proceedings were published in the newspapers.

    At this time, and for three or four years afterward, the agitation had not jarred the foundations of church or pulpit to such a degree as to produce the winnowings, the separations and rendings that were to ensue in 1839 and 1840, when in very deed judgment had to begin, and did "begin at the house of God!" [I Peter 4:17].

    Till then, there were many in the churches, ministers as well as others, who hated slavery and were willing it should be abolished if the peace and sleep of their organizations be not thereby disturbed. But so it could not be.

    In our church at

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    Henniker, temperance was held and preached as a cardinal Christian virtue. The church covenant required of every member "total abstinence from ardent spirits as a drink," as early as 1835, if not before.

    Had the ministers espoused and proclaimed the doctrines and duties of anti-slavery as earnestly, most of the church would as cordially have embraced them.

    My anti-slavery gave some offence, especially when once a slaveholder came and preached in our pulpit, and I absented myself from meeting solely in consequence.

    But only few held with me, and none had gone so far as to refuse sermon and sacrament from a slaveholder, though several men and women approved my course in such refusal.

    It was to the question however, at what college my education was obtained, that I proposed to answer a few words, and directly in continuation of the matter in hand. In prosecuting our mission, Mr. Foster and myself found ourselves at Hanover, and the gates of Dartmouth college, from whence Foster had graduated only three years before, and with more than ordinary college honors.

    I had never before seen the interior of that, nor of any other college, in my life; and to academies and high-schools I was scarcely less a stranger.

    The annual meeting of the Grafton county society had been already held, but in the south part of the county, a full day's drive from Hanover, and a similar convening seemed desirable in the northern section, and Hanover was the selected place.

    It was a full week, however, before any house could be found in which to assemble, and the committee were at length, after that delay, compelled to call our meeting at the dancing hall of the principal hotel. Neither church

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    nor college would open to us a door, nor condescend to give us any reason why we were so summarily denied.

    At the time appointed, however, the convention assembled in encouraging numbers, was duly organized, opened with prayer, and we proceeded to business. Henry C. Wright, of Philadelphia, formerly a Congregational minister, Mr. Foster, and myself were present as principal speakers, though all persons present were cordially invited, as was our invariable custom, to participate in the discussions.

    The first resolution presented was to the effect that in any moral conflict, strength and success depended, not so much upon numbers, as on inflexible adherence to principle. An interesting debate ensued, which occupied the remainder of the morning session, when the resolution passed unanimously, and we adjourned till afternoon.

    At two o'clock we again assembled, when after prayer the following resolution was offered:

    Resolved, That every person in the nation, north or south, who is not an open abolitionist, is by his influence, sustaining and perpetuating [aiding, abetting, partaking in] slavery, and should be regarded by every friend of humanity as a virtual slave-holder.

    This resolution was the order for afternoon. A clerical agent of the new organisation came also among us. He moved an amendment diluting thc resolution to his taste and temper. And as church, college and village made a large part of the audience after closing all their doors against us, the original resolution was rejected, by small majority. In the evening, our resolution read as below:

    Resolved, That American slavery is a complication of the foulest crimes; robbery, adultery, man-stealing, and murder [as per analyses by Wesley and Foster]; and should therefore be immediately and unconditionally abolished.

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    The college students crowded themselves together and were very disorderly, both before and after the exercises began, clapping, hissing, and hooting, in most indecent and vulgar manner.

    Mr. Foster opened the discussion in an address of wondrous eloquence and power of argument, showing how slavery was all the resolution charged and a great deal more, and that logically, morally, every way, the slave-holder must be robber, adulterer, man-stealer and murderer.

    Then he illustrated what these crimes meant in slavery; how a man-Stealer must be as much greater than a horse or sheep-stealer, as a man is better and greater than sheep or horse. Then he asked: "How much greater is a man than a sheep?" [Matthew 12:12]. "Who in Dartmouth college can solve that problem? Who?"

    And yet, he declared,

    "those monsters are hourly stealing the very Christ who died for them, in the person of his little ones. For inasmuch as they do it to the poorest, blackest of his children, they do it unto God! And to Christ his Son. [Matthew 25:40].

    All this, not to speak of the other capital crimes mentioned in the resolution.

    And who perpetrates these outrages? They are ministers, bishops, elders, doctors of divinity, deacons, and church members, presidents and professors of collèges and theological seminaries."

    And he declared,

    "those at the north who fellowshiped such as christians and Christian ministers [i.e., accessories, partakers], are bad as they. They voluntarily make themselves man-stealers and robbers, adulterers and murderers, in position, all of them; and many of them in heart.

    "We do not see them do the deeds, and so we hold them innocent.

    "But what would you say if President Lord, of your own college, should be seen carrying home at night, a stolen sheep? or buying one he knew had just been stolen?"

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    From that time, the order and quiet of the convention were no more. But the disturbance did not begin then, it was only mightily increased. It commenced before the opening prayer, and did not wholly cease during the evening.

    There were those, not all boys, who, during some of Mr. Foster's most thrilling appeals, and blood curdling descriptions, would keep up their scraping, whistling, and snickering, as though they were in some cheap circus or minstrel show.

    Possibly on some battle-field in the Rebellion [1861-1865], they learned their mistake [via casualties].

    For a time we were completely silenced by the uproar. The editor of the Hanover Amulet, who happened to enter at that moment, said in his next paper:

    "Judge of our surprise when we entered the hall where we supposed every heart beat in unison with sympathy for the oppressed, to find general tumult and confusion,"

    which tumult continued through the evening with greater or less atrocity to the very last; and the clerical new organization agent added greatly, and seemed to enjoy greatly, the outrage.

    But no explanation which Mr. Foster could make availed anything. For a long time, he had no hearing at all. When he obtained the ear for a few moments, he abjured utterly, any disrespect to President Lord or to the college.

    He only wished to impress on the minds and hearts of his hearers, the awful wickedness of slavery, and not less of the north, especially the northern church and clergy, in fellowshiping as christians, thèse monsters of iniquity—that for Dr. Lord he had only profound respect; and with good reason, he said, for he had ever been as a father to him, both while he was at college and since he graduated; and that sooner should his tongue cleave to the roof of his mouth than be guilty of uttering one word

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    (pp 212-239)

    culture, fresh from his travels and the hospitalities of the best families of England, rudely and roughly treated on his arrival in his native state.

    And Senator Wilson could have named others besides Dr. Mann, who suffered similar indignities and for the same reasons. James N. Buffum had traveled extensively in Britain with Douglass, addressing immense anti-slavery meetings; but in his own town of Lynn, with him was dragged out of railway cars, making no resistance except to cling to the backs of the seats, which, as they were athletic men, they generally brought out with them, "one in each hand." The railroad authorities at length became so indignant that they refused to allow the trains to stop in Lynn at all. And for several days the rule was enforced. At one time they sent a police-officer with the trains to see that their atrocious mandates on the subject of negro hate were obeyed.

    One day Mr. Buffum saw a white man riding in the cars with a pet monkey in his lap. He good-naturedly asked the conductor:

    "How is this, that you drag out 'the connecting link,' as you call the colored man, and permit the two extremes, the white man and the monkey, the opposite link on the brute side, to ride unmolested as any white gentlemen?"
    The conductor did not reply. He had his orders and must obey them. And the shameful "Jim Crow" car continued, with occasional outrages, till public opinion rose indignantly on legislation, and compelled enactments sweeping them out of existence. "The negro pew" in churches can still be found, north, east and west as well as south.

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    CHAPTER XI.

    DISCUSSION ON CHURCH ORGANIZATIONS BY REV. MR.
    PUTNAM AND REV. MR. SARGENT—HILLSBOROUGH
    COUNTY CONVENTION AT HANCOCK—AND MEETING
    AT NASHUA, BY MR. FOSTER, AND WHAT CAME OF IT.

    The Strafford-county anniversary has occupied much space, but discloses the genius and spirit, philosophy and methods, of the anti-slavery enterprise; and could the addresses and speeches have been reported and published with the proceedings, the wondrous ability of at least some of its advocates, would have been no less apparent. The editor of the Herald earned unpayable thanks for his glowing descriptions which are as just and truthful as they are brilliant and beautiful.

    New organizantion was now asserting itself, and gave us some inconvenience, chiefly through clerical influence and action, as the following incident will reveal:

    In the winter of 1841, Rev. Rufus A. Putnam, Congregational minister, of Chichester, proposed an evening discussion with our faithful friend, Rev. Mr. Sargent, of West Chester, on the question: "Are our church organizations Christian?" Happening that week to be at home in Concord, and the moon and sleighing favoring, I proposed to Mr. Rogers that we attend and hear the arguments. Knowing that our new organized clergy, of most of the sects, were then in arms to defend them, he readily consented, and just as the sun was setting and the moon rising, we

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    set out on our ride of seven or eight miles. A mile short of Mr. Putnam's meeting-house, where the meeting was held, lived Mr. Benjamin Emery, a true anti-slavery man, and there we left our horse and sleigh, and with him walked the remainder of the distance. We arrived in time for the preliminary exercises, which were quite as many and lengthy as at the ordinary Sunday services of that day, now over forty years ago. Mr. Putnam read a hymn, which was sung by the choir. Then the Methodist minister offered (performed, Rogers called it), a long, miscellaneous prayer. The people were not impressed, nor interested; and it seemed a waste of valuable time. Some had come long distances to attend what it was presumed would be an interesting, instructive and profitable discussion, and were impatient, evidently, to get at the business of the occasion.

    It might be uncharitable to presume that the unexpected arrival from Concord had something to do with the prolonged devotional exercises. But the editor of the Herald had voice as well as pen, and it would have been uncourteous not to have invited him to a part in the proceedings of the meeting. But undoubtedly the less time allotted to him, the better it might be for the affirmative side of the question in hand. And so some were not surprised that prayer and praise were thus prolonged, even though inopportune, for still another hymn had to be solemnly read and then sung.

    There was a good country audience, some, like Mr. Rogers and myself, having come several miles. Preliminaries being settled at last, Mr. Putnam appeared behind a huge pile of notes, newspapers, and other signs of most elaborate preparation, and commenced a tiresome apology, for ill health, many duties, including attending a funeral, and general want of suitable

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    preparation and arrangement. He feared he should not be able to speak to acceptance, on account of bodily infirmity, but would do the best he could, and there were others present who would take part in the meeting, which was to be free to all. He continued in this strain till we felt constrained to believe that he had made all possible preparation, and, besides, was not over-desirous that his opponents should have more time than was their right. And so it turned out. He had a manuscript discourse of, apparently, about his usual length, besides piles of newspapers, which he read at intervals, with dry and desultory comments and needless explanations, consuming quite two hours, in spite of "bodily ailments," which, had they been as described, should have kept him at home.

    His main subject, instead of being as was expected, the Christianity of the churches, was the infidelity and Jacobinism of the old organization. And he tried to prove it by showing that Garrison and others in Massachusetts had betrayed the anti-slavery cause, by sifting into The Liberator other subjects than anti-slavery, such as non-resistence and woman's rights, no Sabbath, no ministry, no church of Christ. He did not pretend that these subjects were brought openly into the anti-slavery society, but we were secretly promoting them. He read a part of the phrenological character of Garrison, as given by O. S. Fowler, to prove his secretiveness, and that he did not tell everybody all he thought. And Rogers and Pillsbury and Foster had introduced these subjects into New Hampshire, and Garrison and Rogers had even carried them to England. He read with all the emphasis at his command, something from a print he had brought, advocating the right and propriety of unlimited intercourse of the sexes, and placed it with his other documents, which he had given

    -243-


    (pp 244-251)

    from there to Concord. I don't know of a single habitation in all that distance that would have given us a human reception, had they known us as we were, the mortal enemies of slavery, and of its patrons, the priesthood. We left the river road, on the margin of the Contoocook, and wound our way among the hills to the southward of the beautiful village of Henniker. It brought us at length into a valley behind the high ridge that overlooks the village. We ascended to the summit, where stand the pleasant and comfortable dwellings of our two friends. Brother dwellings they are, near by each other as are the families, twin in affection as in kindred. I could hardly image to myself a more desirable location. Remote, but not lonely, the two families, alone, affording each other abundant society. A glorious prospect stretches around them. Off to the south, beyond the deep, narrow valley, rose high, wooded hills, their heavy hard-wood growth touched gorgeously with the frost-pencil of October. North, the Village, shining at their feet, with its painted dwellings and green fields, deformed only by a sectarian steeple or two and a kindred rum tavern, a wide upland country swelling beyond, rising in the distance and terminating with old Kearsarge, its bare head among the drifting clouds.

    After a most pleasant refreshment, bodily and mental, with our affectionate friends, (who have not yet cast off from their association their pro-slavery church corporation) we resumed our ride for Hancock, among some of the boldest inhabited scenery I have ever seen in New Hampshire. Bold and free as his own intrepid spirit, we passed the farm on which grew up, from four years old, our noble coadjutor and veteran fellow-laborer, Parker Pillsbury. The rugged mountain homestead where he was bred from early childhood—bred to toil; where he worked through all his young life, hard and faithfully as his manhood is laboring for the slave, with almost as little acknowledgement or thanks as the world then awarded him, where he developed obscurely among the rocks. We passed the solitary school housed where he was allowed the few weeks schooling of his childhood. But thanks

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    they were so few. He was educating all the better for humanity's service on that rugged farm. He there taught himself to be a MAN. A great lesson he had effectually learned before he came in contact with seminaries and a priesthood. These proved unequal on that account, to over-match and cower down his homespun nobility of soul. They tied their fetters round his manly limbs, but he snapped them as Samson did the withes, and went out an abolitionist, carrying off the very theological gates with him upon his manly shoulders. He is away from home now; gone on a campaign into Rhode Island, and I will have a word about him. It is due from me, and has long been.

    The abolitionists of the country ought to know Parker Pillsbury better than they do. I know him for all that is noble in soul, and powerful in talent and eloquence. The remote district school houses in New Hampshire and in the granite old county of Essex, Massachusetts, where he was born, would bear me witness to all I could say. He is one of the strong men of our age. I wish he oftener felt his own strength, if he ever feels it and would oftener put it forth, when he happens among the multitude audiences of the lowlands, where he is too apt to keep himself in the back ground. And the abolitionists, I fear, have regarded him too much as he regards himself. He has overlooked himself, and they have overlooked him. He has undervalued his inestimable services, and the abolitionists have imitated him in it. He has gone unpaid—not that, it is not the word he would allow. Paid or unpaid are not the words for him, but unsustained, unsupported. He has broken down in two or three years by giant labor, a constitution of adamant, matured and hardened into iron 'in the school of his early toil. He has broken it down and what has he received in requital? The curses of the priesthood and their vassal followers, and the forgetfulness of the abolitionists. He has been abroad in the fields, and they snugly at their homes; he has performed the incessant labor of the galley slave, with little better than slaves' fare, often times, and hardly better than slaves' wages. He never complains, but

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    (pp 254-263)

    And not only there, but in hundreds of towns besides. And the mob spirit there manifested was mildness itself compared with many other places east and west.

    When the clerical or political party leaders saw that we were determined the cause of the slave should be presented to the people, they felt safe in setting the [white trash] mob on us at any time, knowing that we were non-resistants in every encounter.

    At Hancock, when the volley of stones came crashing in at the windows among the people, the women kept quiet, but a man cried out, "Let's adjourn; let's adjourn." Happening to be speaking at the moment, I raised my voice so as to be heard in the confusion and asked;

    Did your fathers adjourn at Bunker Hill when fired upon by the enemies of freedom?

    The effect was as sudden as satisfactory, and the silence and order continued to the close of the session. The poor fellow with the shilalah in the pulpit had been drinking, but he rose and made a few very sensible remarks, rebuking severely the disturbers, which we applauded, and that rather won him to our side.

    I had often by strategy captured the champion of rioters [mob leader] whom they had crazed with liquor and put forward to annoy me so as to break up the meeting if possible.

    Sometimes I would invite him to a friendly discussion and take him to the platform and propose that I would speak half an hour and he take notes and reply as he saw might be needed. I would furnish paper and pencil and proceed. The plan would not always succeed; neither did it always fail of the desired result.

    I well recollect such an occurrence one terrible night in Vermont. The moon was bright as silver, but the mercury was much below zero. I should have held my man and the audience [attention] had not the rioters began pelting their [own] champion at the table with paper pellets, tobacco quids and similar

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    arguments, doubtless the best they had to offer. He soon kindled into rage against them, and I think would have died then in my defense had it been necessary.

    I was able to continue speaking in the confusion till the disturbing element was shamed into comparative silence, and then closed the meeting. This was unexpected, and some of the most violent begged me to proceed, promising the best of order and behavior to the end.

    But I declined, telling them I had captured their champion [leader] and proved him the most decent man of them all, and now they might have the responsibility of breaking up a free meeting where they would have been welcome to half the time.

    The Hancock convention had no presiding nor other officers, and so was a gathering after Mr. Rogers's own heart, as his graphic but eminently just and truthful description shows.

    While on Hillsborough county it may be opportune to report one more meeting held or attempted by Mr. Foster alone. It was in the town of Nashua, where anti-slavery never had rapid nor healthy growth. The people not coming to Mr. Foster he felt called on to go to them.

    It need not be told again that he differed at that time from most of his fellow christians in modes of worship. He believed devoutly that in all Christian assemblies there should be freedom of utterance, whether by prayer, speaking, or song, as was both preached and practiced by Christ and the early apostles.

    But into whatever religious assembly he entered, his manner was always decent and respectful, and whether he spoke or prayed, his tones of voice were remarkably solemn and impressive. But I am sure he never once interrupted any religious services, except in places where political leaders and religious

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    teachers had used all their influence and authority to keep the people from attending his meetings, which were always supereminently free [open to participation].

    Mr. Foster's own account of the [Nashua] affair will best describe it, and as it was written in a prison into which his faithfulness brought him, it will be all the more interesting. A part only of his letter will here be given. It was dated,

    AMHERST JAIL, May 7, 1842.

    MY DEAR BROTHER ROGERS—Under the superintending providence of Him by whose permission, Joseph was cast into prison in Egypt, and the prophet Jeremiah was incarcerated in a loathsome dungeon, and Jesus Christ scourged, spit upon, and nailed to the cross, I have been given up into the power of my enemies, arrested and confined within the walls of a loathsome cell.

    But though captured, I am not conquered; nay, I am a conquerer.

    My body is indeed incased in granite and iron, but I was never more free than at this moment; I have at length triumphed over every foe; I have achieved this victory by conquering my own servile slavish fear of man, and all the instruments of torture and death, which his malicious passions have invented. * * *

    I was a slave. I am a slave no longer.

    My lips have been sealed by man. They will never be again, till sealed in death. My body is freely yielded to the persecutors to torture at pleasure. But my spirit must and shall be free.

    Equal, unrestricted liberty of speech at all times, and in all places, is my birthright. It is the gift of God to every member of the family of man, and I will defend it in the face of prison and of death. * * *

    You, brother Rogers, and the rest of my anti-slavery coadjutors may turn your backs upoo our synagogues, or sit silent spectators of their hypocritical worship, while the dying wail of millions of your countrymen is borne to your ears on every southern breeze—if you can. I cannot. I will

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    not. So long as the soil of America is polluted by the footprints of slavery, I will speak in behalf of the victim, wherever I can reach a human ear. * * * *

    My countrymen are pirates. [Details].

    They [unconstitutionally] legalize the sale and enslavement of their own "free and equal" brethren. They authorize their transportation to distant ports to be sold into perpetual slavery.

    I scorn the friendship of such a people; it is enmity against God. * * *

    My enemies never made greater blunder than when they sent me to this gloomy prison. It is an honor I did not expect; one I feared I might never merit.

    As your readers may wish to know the circumstances under which I came to this place, I will relate them, with such accuracy as can be done from memory, though there is not time for detail.

    Last Saturday I visited Nashua, with the intention of giving a course of anti-slavery lectures, similar to those I have recently given at Dover, Exeter, and Somersworth. On my arrival, application was made for a house [meeting hall] suitable to my purpose, but no such place could be obtained.

    The meeting-houses were refused [me], for no valid reason, except the Universalist, which was engaged for a course of scientific lectures.

    I called on Rev. D. D. Pratt, pastor of the Baptist church, and requested permission to address his congregation on the subject of slavery, the next day.

    Mr. Pratt refused my request, and remarked that he felt himself compelled to decide what was best for his people, and that he would send for me when he wanted my help.

    I then called on the Congregationalist ministers, Mr. Richards and Mr. McGee, for similar purpose, but with no better success.

    On Saturday evening, I attended a meeting at Mr. Richards' vestry, and spoke twenty minutes or more to an attentive audience, most of whom I presumed were members of the church.

    On Sunday morning, after mature reflection and fervent prayer to God for divine guidance, I visited the Baptist meeting-house for the purpose of occupying some portion of the day in advocating the claims of that part of our countrymen who are held in slavery by the minis-

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    ters and members of the Baptist church.

    In doing so, I acted in good faith to the assembly I met.

    [Examples of What Christians
    Profess to Believe]

    [I.] They said that place was the house of God, and I took them at their word and claimed in it the rights and privileges of a child of God.

    Ed. Note. See details at p 314.

    [II.] They said their assembly was a Christian meeting, and I knew if it was, it would recognize and respect the equal right of all to speak, or "to prophesy one by one." [I Cor. 14:31].

    [III.] They said Christ was their Lord and Master, and I knew if they were followers of his, I should be in no danger of being thrust from their house.

    [a.] For when was it ever told of "the Prince of Peace" that he was seen running out of the synagogue with a Pharisee on his back?

    [b.] Or when did he privately instruct Deacon Andrew or Rev. Simon Peter to drag out the spies that he foreknew would come into the temple "to entangle him in his talk [Matt. 22:15]," feigning themselves just men?

    [IV.] They said they were the sheep of Christ's flock, sent forth by their divine shepherd into the midst of wolves [Matt. 10:16], of which I was one, and I knew if such were the fact, I was in no danger of being devoured by them, or dragged from their fold; for when was it ever heard of sheep that they had devoured a wolf, or ferociously seized, upon him and hurled him from their pen?

    [V.] They said Jesus had commanded them to "be wise as serpents and harmless as doves [Matt. 10:16]," and I knew if they followed such directions, they would look to God for protection, and not to a wicked Universalist; and would seek to conquer their enemies by the power of love, and not by the terrors of the avenging sword.

    [VI.] They claimed to be Christians, and I knew that among such, it would be perfectly safe for me to give utterance to my sympathies for God's perishing poor.

    I rose for that purpose, but was immediately interrupted by Mr. Pratt, who said he wished to commence the regular exercises.

    I did not notice this interruption, and was proceeding with my remarks, when suddenly Deacon Chase pounced upon my back and held me fast in his talons.

    We did not have a regular fight, like some which have recently disgraced the halls of congress, for the one only reason, that I declined a combat with the reverend ambassador of Christ and

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    his devout deacon.

    I would not assert that Rev. Mr. Pratt would have fought in person, had I stood upon my rights. He might have thought that too undignified. He would doubtless have contented himself with aiding and abetting the affray, by giving it his countenance and approval, as he did my subsequent ejection from the house.

    After being dragged from the platform by the deacon, I was carried into the street by three or four men, whose names were not given. I inquired of the deacon, who still had me in his talons, if I was his prisoner. He replied that I was not, and let go his grasp.

    I then turned to go into the house, but was arrested by the deacon and his associates. A messenger was immediately dispatched to the Universalist meeting-house, in search of one of those "ministers of God, who bear not the sword in vain."

    The messenger soon returned, accompanied by Constable Gillis, by whom, with the assistance of Deacon Chase, I was pulled by the arms and collar a distance of fifteen rods or more, to a rum tavern, and thrown on the bar-room floor. Soon after, I was seized and dragged up two flights of stairs and thrown upon the floor of a small upper chamber, and subsequently delivered into the custody of two keepers.

    Having secured me in this temporary prison, the deacon returned to his meeting, to tender to the church the emblems of the body and blood of "the Prince of Peace." I was arrested, as the constable informed me, on complaint of Deacon Edwin Chase, Deacon David Philbrook, Norman Fuller, and another member of the church, whose name I have lost.

    During the afternoon, Brother Preble, a Free-will Baptist minister, came into my prison and asked the constable, who was then present, to accompany me to Thayer's hall, at five o'clock, to fulfill an appointment made for me at that place. This he declined doing, but said he would release me for that purpose, on condition that Brother Preble and certain others would be responsible for my return, provided he could obtain consent of the complainants. Their consent to this was asked, but denied!

    During the evening, one

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    of my keepers left. The other remained through the night, and slept with his clothes on, the door locked and the lamp burning. Indeed, I was as strictly guarded as though I had been a felon, waiting only an opportunity to escape.

    At ten o'clock, on Monday morning, I was put on trial before Israel Hunt. The complaint set forth that I had entered the Baptist meeting-house, "with force and arms," and disturbed the meeting by making a noise, by rude and indecent behavior, etc., etc.

    The principal witnesses against me were Rev. Dura D. Pratt, aud Deacon Edwin Chase.

    As a precaution, Mr. Hunt required them to swear by the living God, that they would tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, relative to the case under trial. But instead of so doing, both of them kept back a part of it, as did Annanias and Sapphira a part of their possessions [Acts 5:1-11], and, what was quite as unchristian, testified to what was palpably false, and what I think they must have known was false.

    None present could fail to remark that their memory was all on one side.

    Mr. Pratt testified that I treated him "ungentlemanly." On being asked what I said or did that was ungentlemanly, he could not recollect, he said, then, but he was certain, very, that I treated him ungentlemanly.

    His answers to my questions on the point reminded me of the lines I have seen, but cannot now recall where:

    "I do not like thee, Dr. Fell;
    The reason why I cannot tell;
    But this I do know, very well,
    I do not like thee, Dr. Fell."

    So with the reverend gentleman. He knew full well that I treated him "ungentlemanly," but wherein he could not tell. But finally, being pressed on that point, he testified that I told him I would preach to his people whether he was willing or not. This, in his opinion, was ungentlemanly.

    Well, admitting [arguendo] that it would have been, it so happened that I did not say it, as brother Preble, who was present, will testify. But I did say to Mr. Pratt that I had come to Nashua to obtain a hearing in behalf of my en-

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    slaved countrymen, and that, if access to the public ear through the ordinary channels was denied me, I should seek a channel of my own.

    As I do not acknowledge allegiance to any human power, I made no defence. I asked the witnesses some questions, and said a few words, but they were designed to influence the audience present, rather than the decision of Mr. Hunt. In that, I felt no interest. My only object was to expose the wickedness and hypocrisy of Dura D. Pratt and the majority of his [heathen] church, that they might no longer ensnare the ignorant and unwary.

    Mr. Hunt's sentence was, that I pay a fine of three dollars and costs of prosecution; at the same time intimating that a repetition of the offence would be followed by a much heavier penalty.

    I assured him I had done my duty in attempting to preach the gospel to the Baptists, and it was contrary to my sense of propriety to pay a fine for it. And I should, therefore, refuse to do it. And, as to threat of augmented penalty for similar fidelity in future, I should not be at all intimidated by it. And so long as any portion of my countrymen were held in slavery, my voice would never he silent, till silent in death.

    Mr. Hunt then ordered me to be imprisoned till the fine was paid.

    At ten o'clock the next day this order was carried into effect, by my incarceration in this loathsome prison, where duty to God and my countrymen requires me to remain at present. Relief is kindly offered me from several sources, whenever I shall think proper to accept it.

    But I feel that the object is not yet accomplished that my heavenly Father had in view, in sending me to this dismal abode. And till that is done, I have no wish to be relieved. To one as restless as I am, imprisonment is oppressive. But I can endure it patiently for His sake who died for me. I can now surely "remember them that are in bonds, as bound with them." * * * *

    But my friends, one and all, be of good cheer. We shall triumph soon. My eye is already on the victory. You and I may be called to yield up our lives in

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    final struggle. Be it so. I am ready. I have already passed the bitterness of death. My enemies have done their worst. I fear them no longer. Do not think me insane, that I write thus. I know in whom I have believed, and that a happier state awaits me when the toils of life are done.

    Your friend and brother,

    STEPHEN S. FOSTER."

    Brave hero! But many did call him insane, even some of his best, truest friends.

    I remember once, in Faneuil Hall, at an anniversary, we had a discussion lasting all an afternoon and evening.

  • Garrison, Rogers, Wendell Phillips, Charles Burleigh and Foster were, of course, all on one side.

  • Rev. John Pierpont, Theodore Parker, Thomas Earle, of Philadelphia, David Lee Child, the gifted husband of the more gifted Lydia Maria Child, and probably others, were on the opposing side.
  • The house was crowded in every part. Mr. Pierpont was speaking, and with quite his usual eloquence and power. I was sitting with Foster, down in the body of the hall. Every ear seemed to be opened, every eye fixed on the speaker.

    Suddenly, Foster detected what proved a fatal moral flaw in the logic. Quietly he rose and addressed the chair: "Mr. President."

    Mr. Pierpont, always the perfect gentleman in every grace the word implies, and never more so than when in debate, ceased speaking and listened. Everybody listened.

    Foster resumed: "Mr. President, will our friend, Mr. Pierpont, allow me to ask him a question just here?"

    "Certainly," was the ready response from the speaker, gracefully drawing back from the front of the platform.

    Foster then proposed his question. I do not remember it, but I well recollect that it lighted up the whole dark, deep chasm between moral rectitude and political expediency, showing Mr. Pierpont far

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    over on the wrong side.

    All saw it, but none applauded, though, in that vast throng, thousands must have approved. The stillness was almost overpowering.

    Mr. Pierpont broke it in a manner that at once engraved him on the tablets of my memory, and embalmed him in my heart's affection forevermore. He spoke only this: "Mr. President, some folks say our friend Foster is crazy. But I wonder what this audience think about it?"

    Only this, when a storm of applause burst forth almost rocking the old "Cradle of Liberty" to its foundations. Mr. Foster's triumph was complete; but the graceful magnanimity of Mr. Pierpont I am sure entitled him to a kingly share in all the honors of that memorable scene.

    Mr. Foster, not without reason and propriety, closed his pathetic prison epistle with the appeal: "Think me not insane because I thus write."

    Insane! Had a like insanity pervaded a small part of the American church, pulpit and people, southern slavery would never have attained such proportions in the name of republican liberty and protestant Christian religion, as to demand the blood of half a million young men, brave and beautiful, to wash its guilt away.

    Insane! Rogers did not deem him insane.

    Blazing down two solid columns of the same page of the Herald of Freedom with the letter, went his editorial comments, every word of which should be here reproduced, in justice to martyr memory and the facts of history. On the Jail itself he wrote:

    "It is providential in Foster's behalf that Amherst jail stands so near Chestnut hills and anti-slavery Milford, so that the friends of humanity in those favored places can come to his relief and comfort in his otherwise solitary confinement.

    "Those two localities abound in

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    ministering spirits to the faithful prisoner. They have seen to the cleansing and purification, to some extent, of this loathsome receptacle of the victims of clerical and deaconish vengeance. They have expurgated Foster's department, I understand, of its vermin.

    "The character of a people may be judged somewhat by its prisons, as well as its deacons and clergy.

    A savage people will support bloody minded incarcerating deacons and dragging-out clergy, and filthy, noisome, verminous cells, in which to shut up those whom it hates and fears."

    Referring to the justice [Mr. Israel Hunt] who tried the cause and pronounced the sentence, he said:

    "The humane magistrate who played the part of Pilate in the matter, albeit he did not wash his hands as the profligate Roman did [Matt. 27:24], fined Foster low, yet so high (three dollars) that he thought in his majestic soul that it would deter him from "speaking again in the synagogue, in this name." He [Hunt] expressed his trust [delusional belief], I understand, to that effect, when pronouncing his solemn sentence.

    "I should love to have witnessed the look with which Stephen replied to that magnificent suggestion.

    "Poor depository of a little brief authority [the judge]!

    "He little apprehended the character or the calling of the man he was dealing with.

    "He might naturally enough suppose that one

  • who had abandoned
  • all the prospects of young ambition,

  • a pulpit, a chance few young men of the time have had before them, (but for his Christian integrity)

  • a reputation, which had he pursued it, would, ere this time, have crowned him thick with literary and ecclesiastical honors;
  • who had abandoned all and made himself "of no reputation [Philippians 2:7],"
  • would now be driven back from the high and solemn duties for the sake of which he had done it all, by a three dollar fine!

    It [self-delusionally thinking that a fine and jail would deter Foster's future preaching] was

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    an apprehension [delusion] worthy the official dignitary who could mistake Christian participation in a religious meeting for a legal disturbance of that meeting!"

    Mr. Rogers had some time before given his [legal] opinion of Mr. Foster's right to enter professedly Christian assemblies, to plead the cause of the oppressed, in language to this effect:

    "Mr. Foster is the agent of the State Anti-Slavery Society, but takes his own way [attending churches and speaking] of performing the duties of his agency. How far the society would approve this new measure we cannot say.

    "For ourselves, we cannot deny the Christianity of it, and we see not how the meetings he enters can, or how they can object to it consistently with their Christian profession.

    "They assume [claim] to be Christian assemblies, and to be governed by apostolic rules and usages. They would be scandalized to be designated as any other than Christian meetings.

    "By those [apostolic] rules and usages, Foster has undoubted right to enter, uninvited, unpermitted, and be heard. They are congregational meetings to be sure, but they claim that Congregationalism is christianity, in its most approved form, and has no other than New Testament organization, principles and usages.

    As political assemblies, they may deny Foster's right. As worldly meetings, they may charge him with intrusion. As heathen meetings, they may complain and cannot be estopped by the plea that Foster comes in as a Christian, claiming under the usages of a Christian assembly.

    "The reply that they are a heathen and not a Christian assembly would put him on a different defense. Whether it would be a defense in that case for him to say that, as a man he has a right, and is in duty bound to enter any human assembly and cry aloud in the paramount behalf of perishing humanity,

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    whatever business might be going on there, is another question and need not be decided, so long as these meetings do not claim to be heathen."

    This, and much more, was written for and published in the Herald of Freedom of the first of October, 1841, in connection with an account of the Hancock meeting of that year.

    Whether Mr. Foster was right or wrong in his course, was never considered by the clergy at all. They assumed that he was wrong, and with equal audacity, they assumed always that they were right in ordering him dragged out and sent to prison, or fined, or both, at the discrétion of a civil magistrate.

    Thus they voluntarily placed themselves, as [professing] Christian ministers, under the protection of the sword of human, worldly authority, while claiming to be, while professing to be, servants and disciples of the prophesied "Prince of Peace." Of him who said:

    "My kingdom is not of this world. If my kingdom were of this world, then would my servants fight * * * But now is my kingdom not from hence." [John 18:36].

    Nor should readers of these chronicles forget who was Mr. Foster, and what was his object in thus seeking the ear, the heart and conscience of the American churches and people, "whether they would hear or whether they would forbear." He was a Christian teacher and minister, not then ordained, though he had thoroughly educated and qualified himself to occupy any pulpit or professor's chair, in college or theological seminary.

    He knew profoundly the history of the church and its ministry, from the calling of Moses and the Levites to Samuel, the earliest prophet; to Isaiah and Ezekiel, and onward to John the Baptist and Jesus Christ and his chosen and ordained apostles.

    And when or where in all the Jew-

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    ish or christian scriptures was it ever read or known that the priests, prophets, or apostles, were to ask leave [permission] of the ungodly to preach unto them the doctrines of repentance, reformation and righteousness?

    Or when, or where, was it ever read or heard that such right, or even duty, was ever forbidden by any "rules or usages [traditions]," still less, laws of divine appointment or approval, in any assembly, Jewish or Christian?

    Mr. Foster, like Mr. Garrison and Mr. Rogers, was a Christian and Christian minister and teacher, in all that those words of hallowed memory could ever be rightly made to mean. And to whom was he sent? Or, if not sent, to whom did he come?

    To a nation of oppressors, the like of whom, under all the circumstances, no age had ever seen [details], from the bondage of Israel in Egypt to the enslavement of Anglo Saxons by Norman invaders, whose deeds of manumission were sometimes recorded on the blank leaves of the parish Bible, kept in the church, secure from all invasion or violation as though sanctioned by a "thus saith the Lord," with the volume itself.

    Foster was himself part of a nation, (no unimportant part, as became apparent), that in the name of republicanism and christianity, enslaved down to lowest brute-beast level, one-sixth part of its entire people.

    He found in his own nation, millions of human, immortal beings, without one marriage sanctioned by law, or sanctified by religion, among them all! One-sixth part of the habitations of the people, houses of open, known prostitution, the holy rights, responsibilities and delights of parentage as utterly unknown, unrecognized, as among the beasts of the stable or the stall.

    Millions of immortal, accountable human beings, and not one of them permitted to learn to read the name of the great creator, under pains and penalties, severe,

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    sometimes almost, as for murder itself!

    Millions of men, women and children, held accountable to human law, as well as divine, of whom a commission of the synods of South Carolina and Georgia, in the year of Christian grace, 1833, declared, as with astonishment:

    "Who would credit it, that in these years of religious revival and benevolent effort, in this Christian republic, there are over two millions of human beings in the condition of heathen, and, in some respects, in worse condition!

    "From long-continued and close observation, we believe that their moral and religious condition is such that they may justly be considered the heathen of this Christian country, and will bear comparison with heathen in any country in the world!"

    Another writer in that same South Carolina synod, on his own account, calls loudly for missionaries to those heathens, saying;

    "I hazard the assertion that throughout the bounds of our synod, there are at least one hundred thousand slaves, speaking the same language with ourselves, who never heard of the plan of salvation by a redeemer!"

    Ed. Note: The South
  • banned slaves reading and writing
  • only recently itself received the Gospel
  • had few Christians
  • most of those, "of the devil"
  • did not teach the Gospel to slaves.
  • To such a [vile, demonized, heathen] people and nation did Stephen Foster come with his terrible words of warning, expostulation and rebuke. Saw Moses and Aaron any such abomination and outrage in Egypt?

    But they asked no leave to enter the house of Pharaoh and confront the tyrant to his face; demand immediate and unconditional emancipation of every bondman in the land, and all his house hold; and flocks and herds, as well.

    Isaiah asked no leave nor license to go to the house of Israel and Jacob, and show them their sins, and rebuke them for their vain fastings and solemn, religious mockeries, while refusing to

    "loose the bands of wickedness, to undo the heavy burdens and let the captive go free [Isaiah 58:6],"

    and break every yoke of

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    oppression and cruelty. His commission was,

    "Cry aloud, and spare not; lift up thy voice like a trumpet!" [Isaiah 58:1].

    And he obeyed; and so did Jeremiah; so did Ezekiel. To be sure, they were persecuted; were imprisoned; some suffered death. But what then?

    They were obeying what to them, was a divine command.

    "Go thou and speak my words unto them; whether they will hear, or whether they will forbear; for they are a rebellious house." * * [Ezekiel 2:7].

    "They will not hearken unto thee, for they will not hearken unto me; for all the house of Israel are impudent and hard-hearted." [Ezekiel 3:7].

    But can it be shown from any history, sacred or secular, that Hebrew prophet ever saw such oppression and cruelty as our slave-holders created and unblushingly confessed! Or even paganism more dreadful than that which southern synods owned covered all their slaveland as with a funeral pall?

    But the no less faithful prophet, Stephen Foster, saw it. He felt it. He felt that he was a part of it [as per Eph. 5:7], till so far as it was possible,

  • he had come out from it [as per Rev. 18:4],

  • separated himself from it, religiously and politically, and

  • consecrated himself and all that he had, all that he was, all that he could acquire, all that he could become, to the work of redeeming the slave, and rescuing his nation from the righteous wrath of that God before whom Jefferson declared he trembled when he remembered that He was just, and that His justice could not sleep forever! [Context].
  • Had not James G. Birney proved by his tract, of stunning power of argument, that "the American churches were the bulwarks of American slavery;" and every witness furnished by the church and pulpit themselves; and Judge Birney himself a ruling elder in the most powerful and popular denomination in

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    all the south? and so soon as he had washed his hands clean from all blood guiltiness in slave-holding, a man of most unblemished moral and social, as well as intellectual character, in this or any nation.

    And had not Foster demonstrated to the whole Christian world, and out of their own mouths, too, that the American church and clergy were a great brotherhood of thieves? A great brotherhood of thieves, taking them at their own word; not producing a single witness of his own, nor cross-questioning one of theirs?

    Why should he not then enter the synagogues on the sabbath day, with greater boldness than ever did Jesus the synagogues of Judea, or the temple at Jerusalem? enter them, though every New Hampshire hill had been a Calvary, and every tree a cross!

    Who was Mr. Justice Hunt of Nashua, with his stupendous three dollar fine, or the deacons of Reverend Dura D. Pratt, or his reverence himself, with Amherst jail and a constable drafted from Nashua Universalist church to drag him away to it [pp 268-271], who, or what were all these to the soul and spirit of one who had heard and heeded the voice of Him who said;

    "I do send thee to a people impudent and hard-hearted, who will not hearken unto thee, for they will not hearken unto me. Nevertheless, go and speak my words unto them, and it shall be known that there hath been a prophet among them, whether they will hear, or whether they will forbear!" [Ezekiel 3:4, 7, 10-11].

    But this account may be extended too far. In closing it, probably it may be as a leave taking from my ever to be revered friend and companion in arms [1809-1881] in our moral but fearful conflict for the rights of humanity. Incidentally his name may appear again in these pages, but that will be all their limits allow.

    The close shall also be in his own words, appropriate climax to his letter

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    from the jail. Under date of Canterbury, January 15, 1842, he wrote to the Herald of Freedom a letter from which the following are extracts. It will be observed that he had almost twenty years [1842-1861] yet before [ahead of] him of fearful encounter, with the no less faithful companionship, who with him endured to the end of the anti-slavery strife:

    DEAR ROGERS—I designed [planned] to be with you in Concord to-day, to commence a course of anti-slavery lectures, but, as you see, I am not there, and for the very morst of reasons.

    I am disarmed if not conquered by the enemy. My voice for all practicable purposes is gone. Since the wet weather came on, the inflammation on my lungs has returned with other symptoms of [more] unfavorable character than those of the original attack. * * *

    I am now laid on the shelf for the present, perhaps for the winter. Possibly for even a longer period.

    Indeed, when I dare look on my shattered form, I sometimes think prisons will be needed for me but little longer. * *

    Within the last fifteen months four times have they opened their dismal cells for my reception. Twenty-four times have my countrymen dragged me from their temples of worship, and twice have they thrown me with great violence from the second story of their buildings, careless of consequences.

    Once in a Baptist meeting-house they gave me an evangelical kick in the side, which left me for weeks an invalid. Times out of memory have they broken up my meetings with violence, and hunted me with brick-bats and bad eggs. Once they indicted me for assault and battery; I think it was on that notorious band of kidnappers, the Boston police and their abettors, the judges of the supreme court.

    Once in the name of outraged law and Justice have they attempted to put me in irons.

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    Twice have they punished me with fine for preaching the gospel; and once in a mob of two thousand people have they deliberately attempted to murder me, and were only foiled in their designs after inflicting some twenty blows on my head, face and neck, by the heroism of a brave and noble woman. To name her in this besotted age would be to cast pearls before swine [Matthew 7:6]; but her name shall be known in other worlds.

    * * * Still I will not complain, though death should be found close on my track. My lot is easy compared with that of those for whom I labor. I can endure the prison, but save me from the plantation!"

    Space permits no more. This whole letter is worthy a place by the side of the most pathetic strains in the epistles of the great apostle to the Gentiles.

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    CHAPTER XII.

    THE MARTYR PERIOD—IMPRISONMENT OF ALLEN,
    BROWN, BEACH, HARRIMAN AND FOSTER.

    Two British women wrote each a work on American slavery, of similar character. One was entitled "The Martyr Age," by Harriet Martineau; the other, by Eliza Wigham, was "The Anti-slavery Cause in America, and its Martyrs." Both were highly interesting and valuable but neither could treat of the later persecutions and imprisonment of Foster and others, for their heroic determination to bring the cause of the enslaved to the doors and altars of the sanctuary.

    A dozen years before, Garrison had appealed to the pulpit, beginning with his own minister, Dr. Lyman Beecher, then of Boston. But his appeal was worse than in vain. "I have already too many irons in the fire," responded the reverend doctor. But Garrison said, seriously: "You had better let all your irons burn up, than neglect your duty to the slave." "I am a colonizationist," said the doctor; "your zeal is commendable, but misguided. Give up your fanatical notions about immediate emancipation, and be guided by us (meaning the clergy), and we will make you the Wilberforce of America."

    And so said nearly all the leading clergy of the north; Congregational, Presbyterian, Baptist, Methodist, Episcopal, Unitarian, all alike. The exceptions, such as were worthy the distinction, were soon proscribed as " Garrisonians," name then below every name. And there seemed a settled determination that the people should

    -283-

    not hear the abolitionists, nor know of their doctrines, nor of their own duties and obligations to the slaves. Many proofs of this have already been adduced; but many more are soon to appear. Another "Martyr Age" was demanded to expose and overturn the power and reign of a pulpit thus given over to work iniquity and practice such oppression and cruelty, in the very name of him who came preaching "deliverance to the captives, and the opening of the prison doors to them that were bound." New Hampshire and Massachusetts were not worse than other states, but in them were many of the fiercest encounters; in them was this spiritual wickedness in high places most fearfully revealed to the gaze and astonishment of mankind.

    Take the following excerpts from one Pastoral Circular, issued by the Portsmouth, New Hampshire, Baptist association, headed, "To the churches composing the Portsmouth association—grace, mercy and peace from God the Father, and Christ Jesus, our Lord:"

    "There are indications that we are on the eve of a moral and religious revolution." This was in the autumn of 1842, and the dreaded "revolution" was indeed upon them, in the new and increased faithfulness of some, at least, of the anti-slavery apostles in breaking down the barriers a wicked and cruel clergy had raised between them and the people, as well without as within the churches. With subtle cunning and real Jesuitry they concealed in their Circular (wishing "grace, mercy and peace"), the names, not only of persons, but.of principles and objects they meant to oppose, and talked about important schemes of moral and philanthropic name under direction of those who have little or no sympathy for pure Christianity; in

    -284-

    one breath denouncing the ministry, and in the next calling for its influence to be manifested in support of their favorite measures for doing good. * * * * * "Making it difficult to counteract their influence in many cases, because of the goodness of the cause in which they profess to be engaged."

    With verbiage vague as this, the Circular proceeded at much length to caricature the faithful laborers in the lecturing field, as well as editors and others, and warning their disciples against presuming on the dignity and authority of those who claim to be set over them in the Lord, in strain like this:

    "Let the churches, directly or indirectly, rule the ministers, let them lose confidence in their religious teachers, as men who merely consult their own personal views and ends, without inquiring what truth and faithfulness to the souls of the people demand at their hands; let the ministry, by any effort of the church, or of the enemies of God, become despised in the eyes of the world, and the chief instrumentality of heaven's appointment for rearing up the kingdom of Christ on earth is gone."

    But the following single paragraph is quite sufficient for all present purposes:

    "We are also aware that the ministry itself is chargeable, to no little degree, with bringing about such a state of things as we herein deplore. May be they have thought, by placing themselves more on a seeming level with their fellow-citizens, by mingling in their debating clubs, and joining with them in their efforts to bring about certain moral improvements, that in this way they would get a nearer access to them with the gospel; but we think that by pursuing such a policy, they have unavoidably lost that reverence which the people must have for their ministers, over that which they cherish for other men, and lost also the end which they thought to gain, by taking such steps. Nor is this all. Ministers have not been sufficiently respectful and decent in their intercourse toward each

    -285-


    (pp 286-305)

    and why may I not speak out? I write amid granite walls and iron bolts and bars. I am a slave, shut in here; so bear with me a little longer as your brother in bonds,

    JESSE P. HARRIMAN".

    Such was the faithfulness with which abolitionists were in those perilous days accustomed to deal with one another, no matter how dear to each other, nor how prominent in position or influence. But it so turned out that our true-hearted friend Harriman received in the same paper with his faithful reproofs of Boyce and Buffum, an announcement which must have cheered and encouraged him greatly in his lonely cell.

    Beach, too, heard the same glad tidings down in his Newburyport confinement, showing him that his work among the Quakers of Lynn had already borne glorious fruit among the most noble and intelligent young men and women in the society; for on the next page of the Herald containing his letter, Mr. Harriman read the following incidental notice of James Buffum, by Mr. Rogers, giving account of a five days' Stratford county anti-slavery meeting held at Great Falls:

    "Our gallant friend, James N. Buffum, of Lynn, was at our Great Falls meeting and afforded the usual aid and interest derived from his originality, good sense, and excellent simplicity of heart. Friend Buffum is not a lecturer; he is better; he is a talker; though his talk very often rises into the most effectual eloquence of speech. Give us enough such talkers and we will talk the infernal slave system out of the sympathy of everybody who has humanity enough left to pass muster among mankind. Our imprisoned brother Harriman calls.on friend Buffum to deal impartially with Quakerism at home in Lynn, as he does with sect abroad. I can gladden friend Harriman's heart by the fact that James Buffum has already, or is about doing it, renounced that broad-hatted type of sectarianism and given it over to Satan, with the faithful intrepidity of a Come-outer."

    -306-

    Before returning to the Harriman and Beach arrest and imprisonment, it will be pertinent and profitable to introduce a brief extract from the history of Lynn, as found in the late, large, and generally valuable history of the county of Essex, Massachusetts. The reasons for it will be apparent in subsequent pages. The extract is as follows:

    "The year 1841 is to be remembered in Lynn as the time of a fresh efflux of free thought exhibited by what became widely known as the "come-outers." These people were primarily Garrisonian abolitionists, starting with the unimpeachable doctrine of human equality before the law.

    "But not finding the cause of the slave well espoused by most of the religious bodies of that day, they unwisely pronounced all the churches, in league with Slavery, and called for good men and women to come out and testify against them. Hence the name, come-outers.

    "They were not confined to Lynn, but they had a strong position here, being upheld by such men as Christopher Robinson, Jonathan Buffum and others, men of private and public excellence apart from the delusion here sustained. The real mischief was from without, as will appear.

    "On a Sunday in 1841, they rallied here in force, determined to try a bold, though foolish movement. The people in general knew nothing of it; but there were in town, Stephen S. Foster, Nathaniel P. Rogers, Parker Pillsbury, Thomas P. Beach, Henry Clapp, Jr., and many others, full of bitter words and martyr spirit.

    "Dividing into parties, they repaired to several of the churches of the largest congregations, entered without ceremony, and interrupted the services with excited harangues. Foster led off at the first church; Dr. Cook commanded him to "sit down;" but as he paid no heed, half a dozen men quietly seized him and carried him out, passive as a log, and set him on the side-walk, his mates following.

    "Pillsbury at the same time, headed an attack on the Baptists; and proving more troublesome, was shut up in a closet and detained till the end of service.

    "Afternoon, nothing daunted, Beach entered the First Methodist

    -307-

    church alone, leaped the altar-rail during the last prayer, and began to talk. No questions were asked, for the thing was well noised about and Methodist blood is not given to hesitation; in a minute, Beach was going "neck and heels," and struggling smartly, down the aisle and steps, more being willing to help than could get a chance. He claimed that his thumb was broken in the affray, but it was not credited.

    "Some of the others had visited the Quaker meeting in the morning, and finding opportunity, without interrupting others, had spoken and been sharply rebuked in turn; but no conflict happened there.

    "About six o'clock in the afternoon, Lyceum Hall was opened, and they made a demonstration of their own, where probably more harshness, more invective, more unreason, were poured out within an hour, than most ever hear in a lifetime.

    "But there was no more disturbance; Foster ranted to small crowds about the streets for a few days, not much noticed, and then disappeared.

    "Others made some trouble for themselves, elsewhere, and their printed effusions were abundant in Lynn; but their strength was all gone in that one effort.

    The foregoing has at least the virtue of brevity. But for truthfulness, if this be a sample of his whole work, it certainly is fortunate for Lynn that Mr. Cyrus M. Tracy is not her only historian. His first mistake is as to time; he should have made it 1842. The second relates to number of speakers who "rallied in force."

    Only four came, and but two of them spoke in any of the churches, or attempted to speak; the other two believed in the right of their companions to speak, under the circumstances, in any christian assembly, oniy observing the apostolic rules of decency and order; and as Beach and Foster felt it their religious duty more than right, to do as they did, Mr. Rogers and I accompanied them in part of their attempts to be heard on that memorable occasion. We were all present at the Congregational meeting-

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    house, and saw Mr. Foster dragged out as a wolf might have been from a fold, though hardly by the sheep and lambs themselves.

    But we did not go to the Baptist house at all till we saw him, from the other side of the common, dragged by a furious crowd down the steps, and thrown violently to the ground, and, as afterwards appeared, quite severely hurt.

    It should be remembered that these methods were not adopted at all till every possible means had been used, from fairest to foulest, to prevent our access to the people, and more especially to the churches. Nor was Lynn, by a great way, the first attempt. Nor was there anything peculiar about the movements there, except in their greater number on one day, and in one place.

    On Saturday, the 25th of June, 1842, Mr. Rogers and I went to Lynn and called at the very hospitable home of Jonathan and Hannah Buffum, intending to remain over Sunday. I do not recollect, and can now never ascertain, whether we expected to meet Foster or Beach, but certainly no meeting was appointed, till on Saturday evening, Mr. Christopher Robinson called with Foster and Beach at Mr. Buffum's, with proposals that something be done for anti-slavery work on the morrow.

    It was concluded that he and Foster would call on Rev. Mr. Cook, of the Congregational meeting-house, to procure, if possible, a hearing for him there, and that Mr. Beach and I should call on Overseer Nathan Breed, and ask for the Friend's meeting-house, for similar purpose. But we were denied in both instances.

    Foster first asked Mr. Cook if he would be willing to allow him to preach for him a part of the day. Th no was emphatic. Then would you permit us the use of the house at five o'clock, afternoon, or some unoccupied

    -309-

    hour? That was also refused, and with threats that if he ever came into the house to speak at all, he "would be taken care of."

    Foster had said no word about going in, but did say, calmly, that it was uncertain where he should speak next day, but probably somewhere in Lynn.

    Friend Breed was told, when he denied us the Friends' house, that he must not be surprised if he should hear some of us speaking in his meeting, to which he replied, "You will find us a peaceable people."

    The next morning, Rogers went by himself to the Congregational house, having understood that Foster would be there, and probably would attempt to address the people. I accompanied Beach and Foster. Foster went forward and sat down in a side slip, opposite the pulpit. It was as perfect a June Sunday as ever shone, but the large house and not less large minister, avoirdupois, had but scattered audience.

    At the close of the long prayer, which at that period was offered with the congregation standing, Foster, instead of sitting down, commenced speaking, in very solemn and subdued tone of voice.

    As soon as Mr. Cook heard him, he turned towards him, and in most military tone, as became a commander in the "church militant," ordered him to "sit down."

    Foster did not obey. "Sit down, sir!" was then uttered with force and gesture.

    But Foster seemed only to hear a higher command, saying,

    "Cry aloud; spare not; lift up thy voice like a trumpet and show my people their transgressions, and the house of Jacob their sins." [Isaiah 58:1].

    At which Cook thundered out, in a tone strangely unlike the solemn voice of Foster,

    "I command you in the name of the commonwealth to sit down!"

    By that time, the sexton and two others came to the rescue, and seizing Foster, (whose non-resistance principles

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    on such occasions always put him into a perfectly passive state), two of them by his shoulders, his face downward, and the other, a most conveniently short man, as though gotten up for just that use, catching hold of him by the ankles, as he might a wheelbarrow by the handles, they bore him down the aisle through the porch, and down the steps to the sidewalk, in the most grotesque and ludicrous manner imaginable.

    Rogers and Beach followed, as did I and several others, who were of the audience, though to us strangers. Foster rose to his feet at once, and, looking at his bearers, said, pleasantly,

    "This, then, is your christianity, is it?"

    He continued speaking, to attentive listeners, too, till the sexton, seeing the attention given, told the people to go back into the house.

    "No breaking in upon worship, friend sexton," said Rogers. "We shall have to drag you out if you do. Don't drive folks in, if you do drag them out."

    The sexton laughed. We all laughed.

    Rogers advised the good-natured sexton to resign and not do such dirty work for such a minister and church. After speaking some time to excellent purpose, Foster walked directly across the common, not many rods, entered the Baptist meeting-house and sat down till the services were closed and the benediction pronounced.

    Then, as the people were moving out, he began speaking again.

    The sexton at the other house had asked Foster, in a kindly way, why he didn't wait till the exercises closed, and then he would not have been molested.

    But Foster assured him

    "that would have made no difference. You would have dragged me out then as you have now."

    As those Baptists verily did. They fell on him the moment they heard his voice, like blood-hounds. They hurried him down the aisle and door-steps to the ground, with such

    -311-

    violence as did him and his clothing serious injury, as there was good reason to think they intended. He, however, rose up and addressed them a few gentle words and walked away to his lodgings, at Friend William Bassett's, at that time a most welcome, hospitable and desirable anti-slavery home.

    Rogers stood thoughtfully surveying the scene, when some younger brethren of "the Baptism of John," assailed him a little in the style of the high priest's palace, in Jerusalem, eighteen centuries ago. "This is one of them," said a beardless youth, with a leer of contempt. Rogers did not deny.

    "You ought to be tarred and feathered," sneered out another, spitefully. "Yes," said the first, "and carried to the county jail."

    "And cowhided," said another, "for disturbing meetings on the Sabbath in such a way."

    "Ah," responded Rogers, "is that, then, the spirit of your worship? Does your gospel run like that, my friends? Is it tar your enemies; feather them that hate you; cowhide them that despitefully use you? Why, friends, is that your way?" [And not Matthew 5:44].

    Some of the world's people were rather pleased, and laughed; whereat, the knights of the tar-bucket ran away.

    At noon, we decided to hold a meeting in Lyceum hall, at six o'clock, and issued notices to that effect.

    Mr. Rogers, never having seen a Friends' meeting, in the afternoon attended their regular service, at three o'clock. He found there both Beach and Foster. I did not go near. All was still for a considerable time.

    Beach was first to break the silence. He said he had a testimony to bear, and proceeded in his usual serious and moderate manner, ten or fifteen minutes, and gradually drew into the then inactive and very indifferent course of the Friends' societies towards the anti-slavery enterprise in particular; but

    -312-

    also on the great evils of war, intemperance, and their like, when a high-seat Friend rose and said to him: "Thy speaking is an interruption of our worship."

    Beach responded that he thought speech was free in Friends' meetings, and proceeded. Then another voice came down from the high seat, desiring the friend to be quiet.

    But Beach kept on, till a third elder rose, and asked to be heard.

    Beach then said, "If anything is revealed to thee, I will hold my peace."

    "I have," said the high-seat voice, and Beach sat down.

    Then the "revealed" word was uttered, thus: "We request thee not to disturb our meeting any longer by thy speaking."

    Beach then resumed; upon which high-seat members began shaking hands, the sign for closing the meeting.

    As the elders and some others passed down the aisles, William Bassett, then an esteemed and much respected young member, called out to them to remain and hear the truth, and not run away from it.

    Just then, his mother, a venerable and highly honored member of the society, rushed forward, and in great apparent grief besought him, in piteous and pleading tones, to desist and be quiet. But he answered her tenderly and affectionately, though firmly,

    "Mother, I am about my heavenly Father's business, and cannot hear thee now."

    He then proceeded at some length, most of the elderly men having gone out.

    When Mr. Bassett had closed his testimony, which he confessed he had too long neglected, Foster arose, most of the women and young men remaining, and some of the elders returning, and stepping on a seat overlooking the crowd, he called attention to "that afflicted mother," as he designated Mrs. Bassett.

    "Mark her distress and anguish of spirit. It would be no wonder, nothing strange or new, should her reason be dethroned by

    -313-

    such shock upon it! And who but you ministers of those 'high seats' would be the guilty cause of her calamity?"

    He was proceeding in such fervid strain, when the older members, near the door, dashed forward, and seizing him with great violence, pulled him down from the seat and started with him for the door.

    Friend Nathan Breed had told Mr. Beach and me the evening before, that we would find them "a peaceable people," should we wish to speak. And here and thus they were.

    But before Foster had been dragged half way to the door, a brave young friend had reached him, and called out to the furious crowd, "Hold! you shan't drag this man out."

    He was followed by several others, and Foster was rescued and resumed his speaking.

    Of course the excitement was very great, but Foster now had full opportunity. He cited [the precedents of] George Fox [1624-1691] and Edward Burroughs, the highest Quaker authorities [who had in turn followed first-century apostolic precedents] for entering any religious assembly, and demanding right to be heard.

    Ed. Note. See background at p 268.

    He called for the history of their example, and William Bassett immediately produced and read it to them all, undoubtedly to the astonishment of most of them.

    The fact was, Beach and Foster had done exactly what the early Friends both [Fox and Burroughs] did, and defended and taught, if they did not command, and their cause prospered greatly through their bravery and fidelity, as did ours that day at Lynn, as has been already seen.

    When, at a late hour in the afternoon, the crowd at the Friends' meeting-house dispersed, Foster and Beach took some notices of our Lyceum hall meeting and walked down, Beach to the First Methodist, and Foster to the Baptist house, from which he had been dragged, a few hours before, intending to read them at the close of their third services. But both were dragged out with savage fury, though both meet-

    -314-

    ings were nearly done when they entered the houses. Both were non-resistants, and so accepted quietly such [abusive] usage as was tendered.
  • Beach had a thumb dislocated by Methodist madness, which cost him severe suffering, as well as for a long time the use of his hand.

  • Foster suffered the loss of a part of his coat collar, through Quaker quiet, and a sleeve cuff by Baptist hands. But that was not all.
  • Though their services were through, he was caught up and carried down to the porch and thrust into a dark closet under the stairs, where the sexton kept the lamps, oil-cans, and other similar sanctuary utensils, and stored him there "some fifteen or twenty minutes." When they finally released him, he made them a short and kindly address, and holding up his damaged raiment, he said,

    "This torn collar illustrates Quaker christianity, and this absent cuff is an emblem of your Baptist religion."

    It need not be said that by this time the town was quite awake. We hardly dared think that our Lyceum hall meeting would be tolerated. But it was, and crowded, too, and continued with unabated interest three hours, and the order and quiet were all that could be desired.

    All four of us from New Hampshire were heard with attention and respect; and though we spoke our extremest thought on the rights of speech and of worship, and of the importance of a true understanding of them for the success of the anti-slavery enterprise, beset by foes on every hand, and of every description, the pro-slavery church and clergy, of course the most deadly and dangerous, the very "bulwarks of slavery," not one whisper of doubt or dissent was manifested by word or deed.

    Foster not only invited, but urged discussion on any of our positions, then and there, by clergy or laity, or any

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    who might differ with us. We had heard that some of us were to be arrested on Monday, but we voluntarily put ourselves on trial, and were now ready, he said, to meet our accusers. But no one appeared. Then nor on Monday. Prosecutions had been threatened, but none came.

    So on Tuesday, Rogers and I returned to New Hampshire, leaving Foster and Beach to pursue the work in their own way, which they did, and with mighty power, and signal success, too, notwithstanding the complacent conclusion of Mr. Tracy, the Lynn historian, that "their strength was all gone in that one effort" in Lynn, as we shall see.

    Foster extended his field with Beach to Boston, and then alone to New Bedford and Nantucket. There the people became so stirred, Quaker population though it lately was, as to break up his course of lectures with one of the fiercest mobs of the whole conflict, and he was solemnly advised to leave the island,

    "to prevent the shedding of human blood,"

    which he accordingly did.

    But he soon after more than completed his course of lectures, for at the request of leading citizens of Nattucket, he wrote and published "The Brotherhood of Thieves; or a True Picture of the American Church and Clergy." The world some day may wish to see it. It ran through ten editions, of two thousand copies each, and produced most millennial results, both east and west. For stunning as the title page sounded, the seventy-two subsequent pages proved beyond doubt or question, that it was true and just.

    But Beach and Foster did not hasten their departure from Essex county. Soon they were in South Danvers and Danvers New Mills. Were both dragged out of meeting-houses there as at Lynn, and for the same offense. Their experiences there were varied,

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    sometimes adverse, then more prosperous, as they happened to fall into the civil or ecclesiastical grasp. They could at least be heard in court, as never in the church. And they were even permitted to decline testifying at the civil tribunal, if for conscience sake they declined, as Foster did on one occasion, if no more.

    Beach would have been a dipped Baptist, at New Mills, whether he would or no, but for the good-natured roguishness of a boy in emptying the water trough; and Foster might have seen one of his South Danvers persecutors severely punished had he been willing to appear against him in court.

    The Herald of Freedom of the 22d of July, 1842, has this brief notice of the scenes, headed

    "Beach and Foster Imprisoned by the Church."

    "Thomas P. Beach, our anti-slavery lecturer, rose to speak in a professed Christian meeting at Danvers New Mills Sunday before last, and the professors [pretended Christians] flew into a rage and fell upon him and dragged him out of the meeting and went to plunge him into a large water trough, they had filled for the purpose, but they found the trough dry.

    "A little boy hearing of their sectarian purpose had pulled out the plug and hid it.

    "It is unnecessary to say that they were Baptists.

    "The same day Stephen S. Foster as I learn, at another professed Christian meeting at South Danvers, being kicked out by one of the worshippers, and the man kicking him, prosecuted for it by another of the worshippers, (because, as I suppose, he had kicked beyond worship measure) and Foster being ordered to testify against him, and declining doing so, on the ground that that was not his way of forgiving an injury, the church fined him.

    "He declined paying the fine, and they thrust him into Salem jail. The New Mills Baptists

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    prosecuted Beach, and sent him also to Salem jail, and placed several Danvers citizens under bonds for declining to assist in carrying the prisoner to jail."

    Imprisonments at that period were frequent of abolitionists, some of whom being non-resistants, were committed for refusing to take lessons in the art of human slaughter, under the milder name of "military duty."

    Most of the victims from our ranks were for the crime of a too liberal interpretation and exercise of the rights of speech and worship, in a country whose government and religion were incorrigibly committed to breeding, trafficking in and holding slaves.

    The imprisonment of Thomas Parnell Beach at Newburyport, foreshadowed by the letter of Mr. Harriman from Salem jail, already given, came a few weeks later. He was kept in close confinement three months, on indictments by the Lynn Quakers and Danvers Baptists. His own account written in the jail reads to this purport:

    "I was indicted on the Danvers and the Lynn Quaker affair.

    Those quiet, meek, peaceable, persecuting followers of Jesus have marched up and bowed their joints at the door of the court house and begged the state to stretch out the bayonets, load up the big guns and rifles, and drive this blood-thirsty Beach to prison sine die, or till he pay a fine of a hundred dollars, which he has no means of paying, and could not pay conscientiousiy if he had.

    "For every dollar so paid helps the church to persecute Christ, making the state her more willing tool.

    "I am not astonished that Danvers' Baptist majors and captains should fly to the courts and the forts, but that meek, loving, forgiving Quakers, who cannot bear arms, which are the only possible support of human governments, can step forward and say to the state, 'Please imprison Thomas

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    Beach because we shook hands and broke up our meeting! Spirits of George Fox and Edward Burroughs, awake! awake!'"

    Most, perhaps all, who were active in this persecution of an innocent but brave, noble, peaceful and conscientious man, have long since passed with him to their final account, so I would tread softly on their ashes, and speak of them only in tones of tenderness and charity. I will let their victim be mainly his own chronicler. He forgave them here; he will forgive them there, or wherever they have gone, and help them to forgive themselves.

    His friends, while he was confined, brought his family to Newburyport, and kindiy and tenderly cared for them. His little boy, three or four years old, shared his cell with him much of the time; and through his prison bars he spoke to larger audiences and to better purpose than ever before; though always one of the most impressive, persuasive, effective pleaders for the deliverance of the enslaved who ever entered the field.

    While a prisoner, he not only wrote some powerful articles for the Newburyport Herald, some of which are now before me; but the friends of Freedom, not knowing whether he would ever be discharged, established a paper expressly for him, called A Voice from the Jail. It ran during his confinement, and was conducted with remarkable ability. Some of its pages flashed as with heavenly fire; every word of them would be worth reprinting, were it only to reveal the power, intellectual and spiritual, of some of the bravest champions in reform, whose word and work ever enlightened and blessed mankind.

    With a very few extracts of articles written by Mr. Beach while a prisoner, this account, already too extended, will close.

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    On the right to speak anywhere in behalf of enslaved millions, ground down into the dust as human being never was before; and when every voice, every press, every pulpit, was bidden to silence, as widely and effectively as possible, he wrote thus:

    "I will not stop to argue nor question the right. Every instinct of my humanity, or anybody's, will sharply rebuke the cowardly, quivering spirit that should moot this query and respond to it; is it right to speak for enslaved, crushed humanity any where?

    "Right to speak in God's house for three hundred new-born babes daily sacrificed to the Moloch of slavery!

    "Right to echo the prayer of three hundred and fifty thousand women, members of nominal churches, that they may be delivered from the lust, violence, and degradation to which a man-stealing church and clergy have reduced them!

    "Right to stand on the threshold of the sanctuary, and cry in the ear of the dozing priest and deacon, thus guilty in fellowshipping hell itself as a Christian institution; to beseech them to lift their heel from the neck of my wife, brother, sister, mother!

    "Right to cry robber, adulterer, murderer, in the ear of a church that buys, sells and enslaves God's own image; that sells Jesus Christ at auction, and then declare they "have not violated the Christian faith!"

    "O shame, where is thy blush? 0 spirit of 1835 and '37, where art thou? Does fear wither thy courage? or startle thee from thy high purpose to deliver the slave, at all hazards? has love, or desire of applause ennervated thy power, or scattered those rays that once came flashing, burning from thine eyes? * * * * * *

    "Oh, if the state could have enough of this work to do, it would soon be sick of supporting the victims of church malice and sectarian hate! * * *

    "I want company here; I wish every jail in Massachusetts and New Hampshire filled with those who have boidness enough to go and charge upon these God-dishonoring corporations, not only all the guilt, for the tears, stripes, groans and degradation of the slave, but also for the bolting and barring of every

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    prison door, the beheading and strangling of every criminal and culprit in the land, together with all the blood shed, from Abel down to the present hour.

    "Oh my God, when will thy children be willing to suffer with Jesus, for a perishing world? when renounce home, money, lands, pride, selfishness, lust, for the cross of Christ and the crown of glory? * * * * *

    "I am in this prison for attempting to exercise speech freely as a man.

    "I felt called on to open my mouth for the slave, in places where professing christians meet to worship. Should I not obey that call? Am I a man, and may I not speak when I think and feel that I ought to speak?

    "Why am I made with these organs of utterance and capacities for thought and conviction if all may be controlled by the power of others?

    "Why have I sympathies for my suffering kind if I may not let them flow out?

    "What did God mean in my formation? Has He made me in mockery? Is He deluding me? Is He trifling with His intelligent creation? He, who never trifles with brutes nor inanimate nature?

    "I spoke for the slave on my humanity's motion, and at the bidding of God, and I am here for it.

    "Well, I will bear it as becomes a man. But let me tell my incarcerators, they commit a mighty mistake when they imprison a nature that knows how to endure privation like this. * *

    "I am a prisoner, but no matter, it is experience—an invaluable teacher. I am an abolitionist now, and can remember them that are in bonds as bound with them. [Hebrews 13:3]. * *

    "Oh, the crime of making slaves of human beings! Of keeping them slaves! Oh, the responsibility which lies on this christendom! Oh, the crime of professing godliness, and keeping humanity in slavery! This is the crime of the churches.

    "Oh, the awful crime against God and man of assuming a priesthood [ministry], pretending it to be Christian, and using its mighty influence to perpetuate human enslavement and hinder a peaceful movement for its overthrow!

    "Speech, glorious organ of reform among men, will it ever be free! Free, it would work wonders. Free, men and women would then speak like God. Now speech is enchained. Men speak as they would walk

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    in fetters, and they look as they speak. The human look is cowered and brought down, and all human action seems constrained and servile.

    The list of the imprisoned could be extended, but the instances given aiready must suffice. They show what manner of spirit actuated both the persecutors and their victims.

    Many more were roughly removed from meetings when they attempted to speak in most decent and proper manner for the enslaved [as per Hebrews 13:3], some of them women of spotless purity of heart and life.

    The churches lost many of their choicest members and the Come-outer [Rev. 18:4] connection greatly increased, especially in Massachusetts and New Hampshire.

    Hayward's "Book of Religions" contains an excellent descriptive account of them, written by William Bassett, whose name has already graced honorably these pages.

    Ed. Note: Full citation: John Hayward (1781-1862), The Book of Religions: Comprising the Views, Creeds, Sentiments, or Opinions of All the Principal Religious Sects in the World, Particularly of All Christian Denominations in Europe and America: To Which Are Added Church and Missionary Statistics, Together with Biographical Sketches (Boston: J. Hayward, 1842 and 1843; reprinted Boston: G. W. Cottrell, 1842; Concord, N.H.: I. S. Boyd and E. W. Buswell, 1843; Boston: Sanborn, Carter, Bazin and Co, 1855, 1856, 1857 and 1858; Portland, Oreg.: Sanborn & Carter, 1853; Boston: Albert Colby and Co, 1842, 1859 and 1861; Boston: J. S. Locke, 1870; and Portland, Oreg.: Albert Colby & Co, 1860, 1871 and 1873)

    Many meetings of them were established, and the present Free religious societies, now so widely known, may be truly said to have had their beginnings then and there. Lynn furnished memorable instances.

    Two months after the Sunday demonstration there by Beach and Poster, already described at so great length, Mr. Rogers was again there and attended the regular "Come-outer" meeting. He wrote:

    "Though the clergy taunt them for their homely name, they must have trembled yesterday when they saw the people throng to their meeting in such numbers."

    Among the speakers on that day was Frederick Douglass, then comparatively new on the anti-slavery platform. He spoke on the subject of prayer, and illustrated it by his own experience while a slave. He said he prayed long and earnestly for freedom in words as he had been taught but nothing came of it. At length he

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    addressed his legs: "O legs, give me freedom! O legs, bring me to freedom! And as you see," he said, "they did it. They answered my prayer."

    And Douglass might have added, perhaps he did add, you "Come-outers" are but fugitive slaves escaped from your spiritual and ecclesiastical plantations.

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    CHAPTER XIII.

    CONVENTIONS AT NANTUCKET AND NEW
    BEDFORD—FREDERICK DOUGLASS DISCOVERED—
    LETTER FROM MR. GARRISON—MEETINGS AND
    MOB DEMONSTRATIONS IN SALEM—OPERATIONS IN
    MAINE—MOBS IN PORTLAND AND HARWICH.

    Here may be the place to go back a year and give account of two conventions, memorable in anti-slavery history, held in New Bedford and Nantucket, in August, 1841. All our meetings, of that and the following year, as has been seen, especially in New Hampshire and Massachusetts, were of intense interest, and peril, too, on account of the new and stern tests demanded of abolitionists, both in their political and ecclesiastical relations. Both the whig and democratic parties and all the great popular religious denominations, as the Baptist, Congregationalist, Episcopalian, Methodist and Presbyterian (new school and old), were all committed to the power and policy of the southern slaveholders.

    And so the text of the true anti-slavery apostles and prophets was: "Come out of them, my people, that ye be not partakers in their sins, and receive not of their plagues!" [Rev. 18:4.]

    Parallel commands include Ephesians 5:7 and 1 Timothy 5:22.
    Instead of partaking in evil, people are to become partakers in the holy divine nature, 2 Peter 1:4. Example: “Let him that stole steal no more,” Ephesians 4:28. Don't be overcome by evil, Romans 12:21. Resist the devil, James 4:7 and 2 Peter 5:8-9. Be holy, 1 Peter 1:16. Abstain from lusts, 1 Peter 2:11.

    Prominent among the speakers at that meeting in New Bedford, were Garrison, Edmund Quincy, and George Bradburn, then a talented and popular Universalist minister and radical abolitionist; though, with the other two named, now no more. We closed late on Sunday, and adjourned to meet at the same place on Monday morning at half-past seven o'clock.

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    This early hour was necessary to complete our business and be ready for the Nantucket steamer, at half-past ten, as we were to commence another convention on that island the next day.

    The "Report of Proceedings at New Bedford" is not now before me; but the following resolution, adopted at Taunton, by a unanimous vote, the next week, on my return, after long discussion, is probably a fair specimen, as relates to the church; and our position was not different towards the political parties:—

    "Resolved, That American slavery is wholesale robbery, adultery, man-stealing and murder, and is the sin of the whole nation, but preeminently of the north; and is sustained by both the republicanism and religion of the country, but preeminently by the religion; * * * and hence no enlightened person should be recognized as a Christian who is not an active, outspoken abolitionist."

    Several of our speakers were colored, of whom New Bedford at that time had many. I think there were two religious societies of colored people there, each with meeting-house and minister. Many of them, however, fled—men and women—to Canada, in 1850, on the enactment of the new fugitive-slave law, swifter than the exodus of Israel out of Egypt.

    One of them spoke so effectively at our meetings that he was invited to go with us to Nantucket, with promise of expenses paid. Not much was required for fare, for he and his wife were allowed only the forward deck, where they suffered from both sun and rain, especially on our return, by rain. Our company, of course, protested, but the rule was imperious.

    The Nantucket meeting continued two or three days and evenings, most ably sustained, and with increasing interest to the very last. Till then I had

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    never heard a fugitive slave speak, nor any distinguished colored man. But as Emerson used to say, "eloquence at anti-slavery conventions, is dog cheap."

    A young New Bedford barber, slightly colored, named Sanderson, never a slave, tall, handsome, made one of the finest addresses I had then heard on the subject of slavery, Edmund Quincy, who sat by me, remarked, and truly, as the young man sat down, "There was not an error of grammar in that whole speech." And it was more than half an hour in delivery.

    Later in the evening, our invited friend from New Bedford, the fugitive slave, came to the platform. The house was crowded in every part, and he evidently began to speak under much embarrassment. To that time the meetings had advanced with increasing fervor, and, as this was the last session, I began to fear a decline for the close. But the young man soon gained self-possession, and gradually rose to the importance of the occasion and the dignity of his theme.

    In the course of his remarks, he gave a most side-splitting specimen of a slave-holding minister's sermon, both as to delivery and doctrine, the text being: "Servants, obey in all things your masters."

    I can vouch for the correctness of its doctrine, from a volume of published sermons [See excerpt, pp 429-434, infra], preached to masters and slaves, (now on my desk) by the then Bishop [William] Meade [1789-1862], of the Virginia Episcopal church.

    There was a parody, too, on a hymn then much sung at the south, entitled, "Christian Union." The following verses are part of it:

    Come, saints and sinners, hear me tell
    How pious priests whip Jack and Nell,
    And women buy and children sell,
    Then preach all sinners down to hell,
    And sing of heavenly union.

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    They'll talk of heaven and Christ's reward,
    And bind his image with a cord,
    And scold and swing the lash abhorred,
    And sell their brother in the Lord
    To handcuffed heavenly union.

    They'll church you if you sip a dram,
    And damn you if you steal a lamb,
    Yet rob old Tony, Doll and Sam
    Of human rights and bread and ham,
    Kidnapper's heavenly union!

    They'll raise tobacco, corn and rye,
    And drive and thieve and cheat and lie,
    And lay up treasures in the sky,
    By making whip and cowskin fly,
    In hope of heavenly union.

    They'll crack old Tony on the skull,
    And preach and roar like Bashan bull,
    Or braying ass, of mischief full,
    Then seize old Jacob by the wool
    And pull for heavenly union.

    Ed. Note: False "Christians" carefully omit the laws of love, carefully limit Christ to being a dead savior, or a new-born. The purpose of limiting, restricting, God, Christ, to new-born or dead status, is to obstruct and prevent having a God who'd issue commands, rules of life to live by. Babies and the dead issue no commands. So the fake Christians, opposing godly law, focus and harp on what they call "salvation" and "going to heaven," carefully restricting and limiting God to a new-born or dead role, a non-commanding role, enabling such "Christians" to do whatever they please without meaningful restraint.
    For more on fake Christians, see the introduction at the Rev. Foster site.
    For full text of the "heavenly union" song exposing false Christianity, see the Appendix, pp 118-125, in the book Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass (Boston: Anti-Slavery Offfice, 28 April 1845).

    I do not distinctly remember that this parody was given in that sermon, but as we so often heard it, and sometimes sung with most exquisite drollery and grace, it is hardly probable that it was omitted there.

    When the young man closed, late in the evening though none seemed to know nor to care for the hour, Mr. Garrison rose to make the concluding address. I think he never before nor afterwards felt more profoundly the sacredness of his mission nor the importance of a crisis moment to his success. I surely never saw him when he seemed more divinely inspired. The crowded congregation had been wrought up almost to enchantment during the long evening, particularly by some of the utterances of the last speaker, as he turned over the terrible Apocalypse of his experiences in slavery.

    But Mr. Garrison was singularly serene and calm. It was well that he was so. He only asked a few simple, direct questions. I can recall but few of them, though I do remember the first and the last. The

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    first was: "Have we been listening to a thing, a piece of property, or to a man?"

    "A man! A man!" shouted fully five hundred voices of women and men.

    "And should such a man be held a slave in a republican and Christian land?" was another question.

    "No, no! Never, never!" again swelled up from the same voices, like the billows of the deep.

    But the last was this: "Shall such a man ever be sent back to slavery from the soil of old Massachusetts?" this time uttered with all the power of voice of which Garrison was capable, now more than forty years ago.

    Almost the whole assembly sprang with one accord to their feet and the walls and the roof of the Athenaeum seemed to shudder with the "No, no!" loud and long continued in the wild enthusiasm of the scene.

    As soon as Garrison could be heard, he caught up the acclaim, and superadded: "No!—a thousand times no! Sooner the lightnings of heaven blast Bunker Hill monument till not one stone shall be left standing on another!"

    The whole can better be imagined than described by pen of mine. I could rehearse as well the raptures of cherubim and seraphim around the throne over the rescue of a thousand souls from the slavery of Satan and of sin.

    Before us stood one trophy, self-delivered, self-redeemed from our chattel slave system, then seething with all the terrors of the second death. And why should not we have rejoiced then and there? For that proved none other than the baptismal, the consecrating service of Frederick Douglass into the life-work and ministry which he has since so wondrously fulfilled.

    Not long before Mr. Garrison's death, I wrote him a letter [Dec 1875], congratulatory, as was his due, on the singu-

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    larly successful completion of his life-mission and work, and expressing the hope that thus "seeing the travail of his soul" was his supreme satisfaction, as it might well be. In my letter, I recalled to him the Nantucket scene, as given above.
    "DEAR FRIEND PILLSBURY—I did not mean that a fortnight should elapse before answering your letter, the receipt of which gave me much pleasure, not only because of the stirring memories of "Auld Lang Syne" awakened by it, but also for its very kind and fraternal spirit.

    "But this delay happily enables me to date my answer on New Year's day [1 Jan 1876], and consequently to offer you the heartfelt congratulations of the season, and my best wishes that this may prove the happiest year you have yet experienced.

    "However, let it bring forth what it may or must, whether of prosperity or adversity, joy or sorrow, health or sickness, even unto death, I have no doubt you will bear with courage and fortitude what ever comes, remembering that our earthly existence is conditioned upon ever shifting vicissitudes and final decay. You will be prepared to say :

    "I'll raise a tax on my calamity,
    And reap rich compensation for my pain;
    I'll range the plenteous intellectual field
    And gather every thought of sovereign power
    To chase the moral maladies of man—
    Thoughts which may bear transplanting to the skies,
    Though natives of this coarse, penurious soil."

    "Your anti-slavery reminiscenses seemed almost literally to turn back the wheel of time and make me fancy that I was still residing in Seaver Place [1840], where our personal acquaintance and friendship began. Since then I have doubled my age, having completed my seventieth year on the twelfth of last month [Dec 1875]. You are several years my junior, and so at that period were comparatively a young man, but stout in heart and consecrated in purpose to the work of breaking every yoke and letting the oppressed go free.

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    "Your coming into the field of conflict was specially timely, and displayed on your part rare moral courage and a martyr readiness to meet whatever of religious obloquy, popular derision, social outlawry, mobocratic violence or deadly peril might confront you as the outspoken and uncompromising advocate of immediate and unconditional emancipation.

    "For then the aspect of things was peculiarly disheartening, a formidable schism existing in the anti-slavery ranks, and the pro-slavery elements of the country in furious commotion. But you stood at your post with the faithfulness of an Abdiel, and whether men would hear or forbear, you did not at any time to the end of the struggle fail to speak in thunder tones in the ear of the nation, exposing its blood-guiltiness, warning it of the wrath to come, and setting forth the duty of thorough repentance and restitution.

    "If you resorted to a ram's horn instead of using a silver trumpet, it was because thus only could the walls of our slave-holding Jericho be shaken to their overthrow.

    "I need not remind you of what you were called to confront in the anti-slavery lecturing field, for more than a score of years. Atrocious misrepresentation and defamation on the one hand, and sharp privations and perilous liabilities on the other.

    "And so in regard to Stephen S. and Abby Kelley Foster and other faithful and self-sacrificing laborers in the same manner. No heavier burdens were borne by any in the abolition ranks, nor borne with greater cheerfulness.

    "The agitation thus produced, the light thus disseminated were essential to the overthrow of the slave system.

    "You, too, have seen the travail of your soul, and may well be satisfied. Laus Deo!

    "Truly yours,

    WM. LLOYD GARRISON."

    So much was said in the last chapter about my native county of Essex, that a brief account of my own experiences there may here not be out of place.

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    A visit I made to Salem in the spring preceding the operations of Beach and Foster in the adjoining towns of Danvers and Lynn, disclosed more vividly the type and temper of "new organization" than anything yet given, not excepting even the Chichester discussion not very long before. It has been clearly shown that the secession of 1840 left the American anti-slavery society bereft of nearly all the evangelical clergy and church members who then belonged to it.

    Salem had a few excellent abolitionists, including Charles Lenox Remond, and the several members of the family, of whom he was eldest son. It was a cold dismal day when I arrived; alternate snow and rain rendering it quite as unpleasant under foot as over head. After two hours of weary walking and calling and denials, I obtained the use of a small meeting-house, belonging to the colored people, quite in the south part of the town. Then I set about posting up notices, such as agents then carried, which unruly boys following me tore down almost as fast as nailed up. But the news went round, and the dark evening brought together the few abolitionists of the place and enough colored people to make a fair audience.

    Salem at that time was almost fatally infected with prejudice against the African color. "Colorphobia" was the name we abolitionists gave the disease, and a more frothing, foaming madness was never visited on the human family. It raged so fearfully that respectable, intelligent, well-dressed, well-behaved colored people, ministers, church members, school teachers, women as well as men, were frequently insulted and outraged not only on railroads, but wherever they were, if they presumed to exercise the plainest, most simple of the inalienable rights of humanity. In some towns, I am quite certain that Salem was one of them, lyceums

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    refused to sell tickets to the best of colored men and women. Even as late as 1845, if not later, Senator Sumner and Mr. Emerson refused to lecture for bodies so bigoted and proscriptive, and their reasons for so declining were in the newspapers.

    At my first meeting in Salem, prejudice against color was the theme of remark. The town had furnished sufficient reasons only a short time before for such a course. On the following evening we held our meeting in a commodious lecture room under Mechanics' hall, then occupied on Sundays by a religious society. But for some reason our numbers were not much increased. There was at that time a general determination on the part of leaders in state and church, especially the latter, to keep the people from coming to a knowledge of the truth. Reason enough surely, for the course so soon to be adopted by Foster, Beach and others, of going where the people were.

    At my second meeting, I threw down the gauntlet to new organization, by a direct attack on the hypocritical pretensions of its anti-slavery. The Howard street Congregational church had had for its ministers, Rev. Geo. B. Cheever, an imprisoned martyr, a few years before, for bold and daring faithfulness in the temperance cause; and Rev. Charles T. Torrey, who had left it a few years before, that he might better serve the anti-slavery enterprise, and who perished subsequently in a Baltimore prison, for the offense, as was alleged, of going into the south to incite slaves to run away from the plantations to Canada or the northern states. With such a previous record, the Howard-street church had set itself forth as a model new organization anti-slavery church, and I proposed on the third evening, to examine its claims, not only to an anti-slavery character at all, but as any kind of

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    anti-slavery instrumentality worthy the respect of the slave or his friends, or the dread or fear of tyrants and oppressors.

    The next evening brought together many more than could find admission, and the defenders of the church appeared in force. Some were communicants, though many more were not; but all seemed inspired, or impelled, or influenced by the same spirit, and of what manner of spirit, the evening was to disclose.

    It was claimed for the church that six or seven years before it had passed and registered a resolution of refusal to hold Christian communion and fellowship with slave-holders. It was, however, shown that the member of the church who presented the resolutions, had since lived a considerable time in Tennessee; was in business among slave-holders there, and lived unmolested; while Birney, Dresser, Crandall and others, not to speak of the murdered Lovejoy, had not only suffered every indignity, almost, short of death, but had finally been driven away from the slave states altogether.

    My direct charges against the church, notwithstanding its anti-slavery resolutions and professions, were,

    i. That its minister exchanged pulpits with the other Congregational ministers of Salem and vicinity, many of whom were notoriously pro-slavery, and violently opposed the whole anti-slavery movement.

    2. When the church celebrated the sacramental supper, invitation was given to "all members of sister churches in regular standing," to sit down at the table.

    3. That Howard-street church was part and parcel of the Essex county and Massachusetts associations

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    of Congregational ministers and churches; all or nearly all of them being in full church fellowship with slave-holders.

    4. That it contributed its money to the support of Bible, missionary and tract societies, that were in part managed as well as supported by slave-holders, whose money was the price of slaves bought and sold in the marker or of their unpaid and unpitied toil under the lash of cruel task-masters.

    5. That both its meeting-house and vestry were peremptorily refused us for anti-slavery meetings, where all persons present were to have equal right of speech and discussion.

    Such were my allegations, and not one of them had to be proved, for every one was admitted, and some of them with unblushing boasts! It was even declared, by one influential member of the congregation, that in his opinion, if a colored family should purchase a pew in the central part of the meeting-house, a dozen families would immediately leave the society. It was doubtless so. Such was the anti-slavery of the Howard-street church, on its own admissions and confessions. And that church was every way as good as the average churches of Massachusetts and of New England, of every evangelical denomination.

    Instead of meeting my charges, the defenders of the church openly accused me with deliberately meditating the destruction of the Christian church, ministry, sabbath and all religious institutions; declared the Garrisonians were doing no good; were arraigning the churches before tribunals of ungodly men; were inducing good men and women to leave their churches, to renounce their Bibles, to disregard their ministers, and closed his harangue, which had wrought him into

    -334-

    a high state of excitement, with expressing a hope that the audience would not be influenced by any thing I should say during the meetings.

    Others spoke on the same side and to similar purport. Late in the evening, Mr. Remond rose to reply, amid much tumult, but gave way for an adjournment to the next evening, in the same hall. That night came the crowd, many evidently on mischief intent. The exercises were opened with prayer and reading part of the twenty-third chapter of Matthew. I then made a few remarks on the anti-slavery character of the Howard-street church, and its strange defense and defenders of the previous evening, and gave way for Mr. Remond. His reply to the charges against the abolitionists and his eulogy of Mr. Garrison, as the hero and champion of the anti-slavery enterprise and faithful friend of the colored race everywhere, north, as well as south, was one of the most earnest, eloquent and impressive utterances I had then ever heard from human lips, no matter of what color or race.

    But it only roused the rage of our opponents. The principal defender of the church generally, and of the Howard church in special, took possession of the floor and he and his troop held it for the remainder of the evening. On announcing my appointment for the next night, I was interrupted by a very ruffianly fellow mounting a seat and declaiming loudly,

    "You can hold another meeting in this hall, only on condition that you say nothing about Howard-street church nor any other."
    Our excellent and brave friend, Mr. Josiah Hayward, who had attended all our meetings, inquired if that was said in earnest and in good faith, and was answered that it was, and was peremptory. By this time the tumult became general; but I succeeded in obtaining a momentary hearing, and pro-

    -335-

    tested against occupying any house or hall unless the most untrammelled free speech was permitted, both sides and all sides having hearing on the subject in hand, and insisted that any church, pulpit, or institution that could not bear the light and the lightning of such investigation and examination, was a dangerous element, that should not be tolerated in any government. Probably not half I said was heard by the now maddened crowd that thronged every possible point of available space.

    In less than three minutes every slip on the side of the hall occupied by the men from porch to platform was not only stove down, but pulverized almost to kindling wood; and most of the lamps were extinguished and their shades and reflectors, if not the lamps themselves, mingled in the general crash and destruction. Then the other side, as the women rushed forward towards the platform, shared similar fate; the doors and entrance were so thronged as to make escape impossible. It was most fortunate that we were on the lower floor, so that many of the women, greatly terrified, escaped through the windows. One fainted quite away and was, with much difficulty restored to consciousness.

    We had almost been broken up an hour before, by a false cry ol fire raised in the vestibule, but the full chorus of confusion and uproar was reserved till now. I learned next day that my friends kept watch and ward over me, having reasons to fear for my personal safety. The threatened violence was not offered, however, nor had it once occurred to me that I was in the least peril; in all those days of darkness and danger, my implicit trust was in non-resistance, and in the infinite wisdom and power from whence, as I then fully believed, proceeded that sublime inspiration.

    -336-

    But we and our meeting were not all that suffered in that visitation of mob violence. While all the proud and popular sectarian meeting-houses of Salem were closed to the cry of the enslaved, and to us who had espoused their cause, Rev. Mr. Comings threw open the doors of the hired hall of his free church and society, and cordially invited us in, charging no rent beyond cost of warming and light; but seeing the general storm of opposition raised against us, the board of directors of the Mechanic Hall immediately passed the following order:

    "Voted unanimously: That the Salem Free church be requested to vacate the room occupied by them in Mechanic Hall forthwith and that the Secretary be ordered to notify them by sending a copy of this vote.

    "Pursuant to the above, I hereby notify you that I shall take possession of the room immediately and request that you will cease to occupy it from and after this day.

    Yours respectfully,

    HENRY B. GRAVES."

    Some little delay was, of course necessary, to procure means of moving, and place where to move; but the next the society knew, their little library and whatever else they possessed there, were thrown into the street. Their rent was ever paid punctually on the day it was due, and the conditions of contract entitled the society, as we were assured, to three months' notice before they should be required to vacate the premises. So here was exemplified, what really was new organized, church anti-slavery; and the best of it, too. Shut out of its meeting-houses, vestries, chapels and every place they controlled, as remorselessly as from any others, we found a platform in a basement hall, secular in itself, though rented by a religious society for its Sunday service, and there we hoped for at least two or three evenings, we might

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    enjoy the right and perform the duty, undisturbed, of pleading the cause of the down-trodden, despised and oppressed slaves. And with such results as are here only faintly and partially, but truthfully described. Thus desperately determined were the leaders and chiefs of both church and state, to prevent, as far as possible, the spread of genuine, uncompromising anti-slavery truth.

    I held one more meeting, but had to return to the colored people's Bethel where the series began; and it should be said to the crédit of that little despised church and society, that their conduct throughout the whole scene, was noble, manly, womanly, brave and heroic to the last degree, though subjected at times to insult and outrage almost too shameful for human nature to endure.

    The last meeting was as riotous as either of the others, though the noise was mostly in the porch and outside, though not all.

    One old deacon, who need not be named, as he must [now, 1883] have been dead many years, abused the colored people grossly in his talk. But he was let off as he deserved, as he doubtless felt most, with a silent contempt. I was told that he was frequently guilty of similar behavior towards the people of color, though many, if not most of them in the town, were in every way his superiors.

    One woman, compelled by sickness to leave the meeting, was roughly assaulted in the porch, her cap and bonnet were torn off, and her dress otherwise badly damaged.

    An inoffending colored young man was also attacked in the porch, knocked down and then pitched headlong into the street; he gathered himself up and ran, but was chased. In the dark, he threw a stone at his pursuers, which, if it hit, did not hurt so badly as to prevent the ruffian from prosecuting him and bringing him, next morning into court.

    -338-

    The case was brought before Hon. J. G. Waters. I attended, determined if possible to see justice done. To my surprise and satisfaction, Judge Waters, after patient hearing of the parties, dismissed the case, severely reprimanding the complainant, and telling him he was the offender, and more deserved punishment than the young man he had arrested.

    Thus terminated my first anti-slavery visit to that ancient town [Salem]. I had good reasons to believe my humble services were not lost upon it; Essex county became famous in the cause of true and unfaltering anti-slavery, and even its political abolitionists, some of them, were of the very bravest and best. Its Evangelical pulpits were always conservative, some of them even bitterly so; the Unitarians and Universalists furnished some eminent exceptions; and the names of Thomas T. Stone, Samuel Johnson, John L. Russell and Willard Spalding will always be had in honor as the unfaltering friends of radical, uncompromising anti-slavery.

    But returning to the narrative, it should be borne in mind by readers that the incidents related here, though numerous, are only representative of thousands which will never be recorded; or, as is hyperbolically declared in the new Testament [John 21:] of the works of another, "the world itself might not contain the books which should be written;" for our conflict extended over thirty years.

    A day's work and its incidents, in which I had a partner, a quiet young beginner in the service, will not be inappropriate, as following the scenes and experiences of Salem.

    In the early spring of 1852, I made a little tour in the state of Maine, in which I was joined by Alonzo J. Grever, now an eminent lawyer at the west. He

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    was then in the course of his studies, but well up in anti-slavery knowledge, interest and earnestness.

    On a snowy, sleety, windy morning, we arrived in Brunswick, perfect strangers to every human inhabitant. Dropping our not capacious valises at a corner grocery, we ventured out to reconnoitre, with a view to an evening meeting.

    The low, level land was covered with the melting and melted snow and mud, making walking disagreeable, indeed. And we were not sorry that no suitable place within our means, could be had for our lectures, as it would be nearly impossible, under such circumstances, to secure attendance and a collection that would pay the expenses of the hall.

    So after an hour or two of prospecting, under much difficulty and discouragement, we concluded to abandon Brunswick, with its college and churches, and try what Freeport, the next, and much smaller place, might do for us.

    The skies were still scowling, and some large snow-flakes continued to fall, melting, mostly, as they reached the ground. It was ten o'clock, or after, when we picked up our satchels and set out for Freeport, seven or eight miles off. The walking was bad, of course; but my companion was young and valiant, and I had not then grown old.

    By two o'clock we reached our destination, having been on our feet nearly five and a half hours, the ground cold and wet and snow falling most of the time. And the Brunswick heart and hospitality were colder and more repelling than the weather.

    Our first inquiry on reaching Freeport, was for a hall. We soon found one of unattractive appearance, over a store, entered by a flight of outside stairs. It had no seats, only round the sides, facing used mainly, probably, for dancing.

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    We could have it in the evening, seating, warming and lighting it ourselves, for some small sum, probably not more than one dollar.

    Our next business was to give notice. For that purpose, after posting a written bill or two at the post office, and another store, we entered the street, beginning at one end, one of us on one side and the other on the opposite, and walked its entire length, calling and leaving word at every house. That occupied an hour or more, bringing us to the middle of the afternoon.

    We did not forget that we had not dined, but till our hall was secured and the people notified of our meeting, dinner had to wait. We dined for a few cents, on such crackers and cheese or herrings as the grocery afforded, no unusual occurrence with us in those days, and then proceeded with our evening preparations.

    There being no tavern in the town, we first looked up lodgings for the night. A woman who kept a few boarders [mini-hotel] consented to entertain [lodge] us, though we told her that having just dined, we should need no supper, and might not call on her till after the meeting.

    Returning to our hired hall, we called at a house where there was plenty of dry wood, and paid the owner a four-pence-ha'-penny for as much as we could carry in our arms, and that furnished our evening fire. Then for seats, we borrowed some soap or candle boxes of the store-keeper, who seemed much to admire our thrift, and with a few boards laid on them, that need was met.

    It now only remained to procure the light. For that, we bought a pound of tallow candies, ten to the pound, and the good-natured store-keeper, I am sorry to have forgotten his name, threw us in five good-sized potatoes, out of a barrel, which, slashed in halves and bored, made ten, not the

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    apocalyptic "golden," but good and sufficient candle-sticks. This was nothing new with us. I often lighted halls in that way. Once, I well remember, in Cleveland, Ohio, only with this difference, that round turnips were used instead of potatoes.

    It was almost dark when our preparations were completed, so we kindled the fire, lighted a candle, and, contentedly enough, sat down for a little rest, before the meeting should commence.

    It was more than thirty years ago, in a small country village, the day had been stormy or cloudy, darkness came on early, and so did our audience. It was composed wholly of men and boys. That was neither new nor strange.

    No anti-slavery meeting had ever been held or attempted there before, so far as we could learn. Others might be held possibly to excellent purpose.

    We were respectfully heard, so soon as we could get understood.

    As no women were present, some did not hasten to put away their cigars when we commenced speaking. "Chewing the cud" seemed almost as common as among the cattle in the stall. Neither was that any surprise; seeing it as we had from our boyhood, in even the meeting-houses on Sunday, as well as in the pulpits and pews.

    Generally if we asked for a collection something would be raised, at least sufficient to pay for the hall. In this instance, as we traveled into and out of town on foot, and paid but sixteen and a quarter cents for fire and lights, and a very small fee for the room, I have forgotten how little, we surely were not, so far, much out of pocket.

    What our boarding-house charges would be, we had not then ascertained. But we did learn, a few minutes later, when we put out our candles, and, valises in hand, presented ourselves at the door. We were permitted to enter and sit down.

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    Then our prudent hostess told us that had she known what was the object of our "going about," and what sort of lectures we gave, she should not have consented to take us into her house. Her family, she said, were bitterly opposed to us and our [anti-slavery] work; and a good deal more in similar tone and spirit. But as there was no other place where we could get in, she would keep us over night, though we must leave as soon as we were up in the morning. We staid.

    Supperless to bed and breakfastless on the road next morning, baggage in hand, and almost before the villagers were any of them abroad, was pretty rugged discipline for my new comrade, but he bore it well; and, doubtless, should he write a sketch of that day and night adventure he would enliven it with many incidents which have escaped my recollection, or which, for sake of brevity, I have omitted, and yet it was in no important sense peculiar or unusual. Every earnest, faithful, anti-slavery lecturer in those dark and often perilous days, encountered the same or much more disagreeable every week, all the year through, especially when, as we were then, breaking in to new and unexplored fields.

    But older and more cultivated grounds did not always greet the coming of the apostle with anything like the Hebrew strain: "How beautiful upon the mountains are the feet of him who bringeth good tidings [Isaiah 52:7; Romans 10:15]," as the following account of a Portland meeting proves:

    The autumn of 1842 was memorable for the vigor, earnestness and success, too, of the anti-slavery movement in eastern Massachusetts and eastern New Hampshire. Extensive accounts of meetings and movements in Lynn, Salem, Danvers, Georgetown and

    -343-


    (pp 344-351)

    passable roads making their worst faces at me, and elongating their fearful miles to immeasurable extent.

    The good old lady, however, insisted on my eating dinner, from which she and her daughter had just risen. Then, with both hands full of bags and bundles, I set off, on foot, for Saco, five or six miles.

    I never in my life saw such intolerable walking in New England. The soil, much of the way, was clay, and the frost just coming out of it, and then a mingling of snow, it made a complete compound of Bunyan's "Slough of Despond," "Enchanted Ground," "Hill of Difficulty," and all his dragons.

    The cold north-east wind, too, blew full in my face, and every sign denoted immediate storm. I plunged along as fast as possible, to escape that additional woe, and reached Saco and Biddeford late in the afternoon, possibly somewhat fatigued, and perfectly parboiled in perspiration. It was a pilgrimage not to be forgotten.

    The week has gone—and it has been one of most uncommon labor, disappointment, vexation and suffering. I have lectured to everybody who came near me, but my labors in that line were confined to Rochester, and two meetings.

    My traveling expenses have been three dollars and seventy-five cents, to say nothing of my walking, which was worth twice as much; my receipts have been one dollar and five cents, and I have not procured one single subscriber to the Liberator nor to any of our papers.

    Such is the experience of one week. Who would not be a soldier in such a warfare?

    Yours, still full of hope and trust,

    PARKER PILLSBURY.

    Portland, April 12, 1852.

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    A. J. Grover rejoined me in Portland [Maine], and our next campaign included Brunswick and Freeport, of which report has been already given.

    One more riotous demonstration should have place [mention] in these chronicles, but space and time must make it both brief and the last. It occurred in Harwich, Mass., on Sunday, the fourth and last day of a grand anti-slavery convention, held in a beautiful grove, in September of the year 1848. No building on the Cape could have held half the attendance.

    Cape Cod at that time was the birth-place and nursery of more sea-captains than any other portion, of equal extent on the whole Atlantic coast. And many of the most eminent of them were early able and faithful friends and supporters of the anti-slavery enterprise.

    But sea-captains were not all abolitionists, else the Harwich Sunday tumult, in defense of the church as "the bulwark of slavery," would not have transpired.

    The constitution of the country, the courts, the political parties, the commerce and trade, had all been shown to be conducted [aiding, abetting, and partaking] in the interest of slavery, and no riotous demonstration appeared.

    But not so on Sunday, when the churches and clergy were arraigned as the bulwark and forlorn hope of the accursed institution.

    The mob at Harwich was the result of an exposure of a diabolical deed by the captain of a coaster, sailing between Norfolk and New York, and other northern ports. I am glad to have forgotten his name, and do not care ever to hear it spoken again.

    But while in Norfolk, not long before our convention, a slave came on board and asked this captain what he would charge to carry him and another to New York or Boston. A contract was made for one hundred dollars—paid in advance. The captain

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    pocketed the cash, then went on shore, betrayed the poor slave, had him arrested, imprisoned and advertised, and then sailed north, bringing the hundred dollars.

    We who knew the slave system, could imagine the fate of the imprisoned victim, though we never heard what it was. The cruel captain never told us that, though undoubtediy he knew, for when he went back to Norfolk he carried the money, found the owner, paid him over the hundred dollars, and received back twenty-five as his reward!

    Twenty-five dollars for a deed that no Modoc nor Apache Indian under heaven would ever have done! In cold, unprovoked blood—never!

    Sunday was the fourth and last day of our convention, and not less than three thousand people were on the ground. Some estimated them at four thousand.

    I learned all the facts I have just given, from the captain himself, early in the day. In the afternoon, when the crowd was the greatest, I made a full statement of the case, in words as fitting as were then at my command. Of course the effect on the audience was intense, but dependent on the estimate which different persons placed on the transaction between the captain and his helpless victim.

    In the tumult, the captain came to the platform, and not having heard my statement, he demanded, in great wrath, who it was that accused him of stealing! He said somebody had just told him he had been accused of stealing.

    He was answered that his name had not been mentioned there; and that nothing had been said about stealing.

    He said he had a right to be heard, and wished to be heard. We cheerfully accorded him the platform. He came forward, and in the frankest, blandest manner, stated his own case

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    in his own words. When he concluded, we invited him to a seat on the platform, which he accepted.

    Stephen Foster spoke next. He began in quite a conversational tone to say: Mr. Chairman—We have now heard from his own mouth, what our friend had to say of the matter in hand. And he confirms every statement of Mr. Pillsbury, excepting one: he has not told us that he is a member in good and regular standing of the Baptist church, as Mr. Pillsbury assured us he was. Now I wish to ask him if that is also true. He admitted that with the rest.

    Foster then opened his argument. And those who ever heard him can more easily imagine than I can describe, its power. Every eye kindled, every heart throbbed, with admiration, or with rage and wrath. I had often heard him called "a son of thunder," before. At that moment, he seemed Father of the seven thunders of Patmos, with all their bolts at command.

    He swayed those hundreds and thousands as prairie cyclones, the vast fields of corn. And yet the captain, really on trial, listened to every word with respect and attention. I knew he heard a voice within, louder, more eloquent than the utterances of Foster, and whose rebuke he could not resist.

    The [pro-slavery] mob spirits now rushed for the platform, and with oaths and curses of stunning power, called on the captain to pitch him [the speaker, Rev. Foster] down to them. Their number seemed legion; and their nature and spirit like that other [demon] legion, known of old. [Mark 5:9, Luke 8:30].

    The captain mildly replied to them that he wished none of their interference nor defense. He left the platform soon after, and moved out of the crowd, and held a long conversation with some Boston abolitionists, who had come down on purpose to attend the convention. And he very frankly told them that he had no fault to find

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    whatever with our treatment of the matter, nor of him. Nor did he ever after complain, that we heard. [More, p 358, infra].

    Mr. Foster kept his feet and held the crowd at bay, showing our [pretended Christian] religion to be falsehood and hypocrisy, when a member of the orthodox church, who had just come from his meeting, (and it was said from the sacrament), leaped like a lion on to the platform.

    His eyes flashed fury if not fire; his teeth and fists were clenched, and he seemed a spirit from the pit, who might have been commissioned to lead its myrmidons in a deadly fray, for such a faith and such a church as his, that a dozen years before [1840] had been proved by [James Birney] one of its most eminent members,


    "THE BULWARK OF AMERICAN SLAVERY."


    He asked no leave to speak; paid no respect to president or rules. His first note was a shriek. "It's a lie; what you say is a lie; a damned lie! and I'll defend the church!"

    But he was immediately outvoiced by the yelling troop, who leaped like tigers at his heels, as into the arena, and added fearful deeds to his not less fearful words.

    What became of my platform companions I did not see. I was immediately seized, and with kicks, blows, and dilapidated clothing, hurled to the ground.

    There lay Captain Chase and Captain Smith, of Harwich, both old men, who, with many others, had sprung to our defense. There the two lay, their faces covered with blood! They were both radical peace men, and only remonstrated with our remorseless assailants. But both of them would willingly have died in our stead, or in our defense. Truer, nobler men never lived.

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    Havoc was soon made of our platform and what it contained. It was roofed over, but a temporary structure, for officers and speakers, and aged persons who sought its convenience and comfort. William Wells Brown, one of our eloquent fugitive slave lecturers, was roughly seized up and pitched over back of the platform by the infuriated crowd, down some six or eight feet, and left to his fate. Mr. Foster was rescued and taken away from danger—his Sunday frock coat rent in twain from bottom to top, and his body considerably battered and bruised.

    Lucy Stone stood heroically with the rest of us, ready for any fate. But her serene, quiet bearing disarmed the vulgar villainy of our assailants, and she escaped unharmed.

    I have seen many mobs and riots in my more than forty years of humble service in the cause of freedom and humanity, but I never encountered one more desperate in determination, nor fiendish in spirit, than was that in Harwich, in the year 1848.

    And that mob was wholly, directly and undeniably in defense of the American church. "I'll defend the church," was the wild shout of the baptized ruffian who led the hordes, as he vaulted unbidden to our platform of moral and peaceful agitation and argument in behalf of our enslaved millions. "I'll defend the church," and his infuriated, yelling and blaspheming troop followed him, and commenced their fell work.

    Yes, to save the church was that dire scene enacted. The church that Judge Birney had proved out of her own mouth was the "bulwark of American slavery in every one of her largest, most popular denominations!" Church, clergy, and theological seminary, everything,

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    indeed, under ecclesiastical control. And Hon. James G. Birney was surely among her choicest leaders and brightest lights.

    To my own account of this remarkable scene, perhaps should be subjoined at least an excerpt of the official proceedings of the convention. The following is the close of it:

    Parker Pillsbury related a fact illustrative of the truth of the resolution under discussion of a sea-captain, of Cape Cod, a member of the Baptist church. [Details, pp 353-356, supra].

    Immediately the captain's friends reported to him that he had been slandered, upon the platform, and in due time the captain presented himself and demanded why he had slandered him, on that platform?

    He was assured that his name had not been spoken by any one on the platform, and that if he would wait for the speaker to conclude his remarks he should have opportunity to say all he wished.

    Accordingly, when the speaker sat down, the captain took the platform, and stated the facts precisely as Pillsbury had done, so it was manifest that there was no slander, nor even contradiction between them.

    S. S. Foster then proceeded to dissect the transaction, as stated by the captain himself, and to find its moral quality.

    It was a process which he well understood, nor did he fail to expose the deformity of the deed, and cause its infamy to stand out in fearful blackness before that great assembly.

    The captain said he had nothing to reply, and left the platform as quietly as he had come upon it, saying he had not come there to make any disturbance.

    Foster then held up to the audience, in its true character, the religion, under whose cherishing influence such crimes take root and grow, and asked who would defend such a church?

    At that moment Captain Stillman Snow, a member of the Congregational church under the pastoral care of Rev. Cyrus Stone, (who we are credibly informed, went about among his people and advised them to stay away from our meeting), this Captain Snow, steaming from his own meeting, rushed

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    through the crowd in front of Foster, screaming at the top of his voice,

    "I'll defend the church. What you say is a lie, a damned lie!"

    His lips trembled, his head shook upon its socket, like a leaf rattled by the winter tempest, while his countenance looked as if the genius of rage had his dwelling there.

    He made a leap at Foster, which was a signal for his allies. In a twinkling, there was a rush upon the platform.

    W. W. Brown, a fugitive slave, was seized and thrown over the high back of the platform, where he was trampled on by the throng gathered there.

    Pillsbury, with torn clothes, was dragged from the platform, receiving as he went, kicks and blows from those behind him. Those in front of him were harmless, awed by his fearless words, and undaunted look.

    Again and again, some desperate spirits, with clenched uplifted fists, swore vengeance and destruction, but like the old Roman, Pillsbury calmly replied "strike, but hear me."

    While he was thus beset on every hand, S. S. Foster was assailed in another direction no less violently. At the first onset he hastened Lucy Stone from the platform, but had scarcely time to turn about, when the mob, thirsting for his blood, closed in around him, seizing him with desperate violence, wherever they could lay their hands upon him, and though they did not "part his garments among them [Matt. 27:35]," they quite divided his coat.

    For a few moments the most terrible confusion prevailed—all ran, without knowing whither they went—so great was the excitement that neither friends nor foes recognized each other. One friend would take hold of the arm of Foster for his protection, and another friend would pull him off supposing him an enemy.

    One friend would step forward to stay an uplifted blow, and another friend would push him aside, supposing that he intended himself to strike. The scene baffled all description.

    At this juncture a shout was raised that they were riding Foster on a rail. This false cry was most opportune for Brown, who, during the whole time, had been dragged and trampled by the mob. Now his tormentors left him to see the ruin of Foster, and thus he made his escape, rifled by these

    -359-

    pious defenders of the nation's religion, of quite a number of his Anti-slavery Harp.

    Foster, who had been surrounded by the mob, showed no sign of fear or fright. The man who had never quailed in peril's blackest hour, was not the man now to tremble or flee.

    But the friends, apprehensive for his safety, urgently solicited him to leave the ground; and when he did not manifest a disposition to go, they took him, with most unpleasant haste, outside the grove, aided by the mob, who were pushing terribly in the rear, and on all sides.

    When Pillsbury ascertained that Brown and Foster were safe, and that nothing more could be done, he, too, left, taking the public road towards the house of Captain Small, a well-known friend of the oppressed.

    The mobocrats, who had returned to the grove howling and yelling in their rage and disappointment, that Foster was out of their clutches, when they found that Pillsbury was leaving, followed in hot pursuit, raising the dust higher than the trees, filling the air with demoniac screams and yells, which were heard at the distance of more than a mile, and frighful enough to make Pandemonium itself pale.

    They rushed on headlong about thirty rods [495 feet], and then, though Pillsbury was walking only a short distance in front of them, for reasons best known to themselves, they turned back to the grove, cursing as they went, and proceeded to vent their rage upon the platform, which they soon demolished.

    While they were tearing up the planks they were uttering most dreadful oaths, and vowing vengeance on the lecturers, (should they ever make their appearance there again) who, they said, had assailed their laws and their religion, which they were going to defend.

    The world will judge what kind of laws and what kind of religion need such a [mob] defense.

    It was a proud day for anti-slavery, and one which the friends will long have occasion to remember with gratitude.

    The lecturers were not particularly disturbed until all had been said which they wished to say, until every nail was driven in the right place, and then the mob clenched them.

    They meant their violence for evil,

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    but God meant it for good.

    The dragon's teeth, which they were then unconsciously sowing, will yet come up, a host of true-hearted anti-slavery men and women, who will redeem Cape Cod from the false ["Christian"] religion which now curses and enslaves it.

    Much praise is due to the friends, who are too numerous to mention, who so nobly stood by those whose lives the hungry mob were seeking.

    Nor would we fail to make suitable mention of others, who, during the day on Sunday, were active in exciting the mob spirit. Prominent among them was Henry C. Brooks, a merchant of Boston, of the firm of Crowell & Brooks, 38 Commercial street, son of Obed Brooks, Esq., of Harwich.

    The good effect of the mob is already manifest in the increased activity and interest of the friends on the Cape, whose liberal contributions to the cause have been nearly doubled, and who see new reasons for girding themselves to more vigorous effort in behalf of human freedom.

    ZEBINA SMALL, President.
    CHARLES STEARNS,
    LUCY STONE,
    Secretaries.

    Only time, space and patience of readers prevent insertion of the whole of the able report of the secretaries of that phenomenal convention. Most of the names of the rioters mentioned in the extract given are suppressed.

    No other mob or riot will be described in this work. Such as are given are but representative of many, very many; some less destructive to property and harmful to person, and some others in those respects a great deal worse.

    And now, wondrous to tell, with such records, the [lying] church and clergy claim and boast that they abolished slavery!

    The real, everlasting truth is, we had almost to abolish the [Christian] church before we could reach the dreadful institution at all.

    We divided, if we did not destroy. Not to speak of the General Assembly of the

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    Presbyterian church at all, we did divide and even subdivided the General Conference of the Methodist Episcopal church.

    The slavery question certainly produced rupture in the American Board of Foreign Missions, the Baptist Board of Foreign Missions and the American Tract Society, as has been, or as will be shown.

    If it be said that it was their own internal heat that was consuming them, the answer would be it was not light and fire from heaven, the divine illumination of the Holy Ghost, or their differences would not have been so easily reconciled by surrendering the whole ground to the enemy; the Northern Methodist Conference retaining thousands of slave-holders and tens of thousands of slaves, and six of the very largest of the slave states, besides Delaware and Maryland.

    The two missionary boards and tract society threatened at one time some separation or purification, but to what purpose will be made to appear.

    The institution at Oberlin, Ohio, was first to attempt a new standard for freedom in education and religion, irrespective of sex, complexion or race, with a professedly anti-slavery board of teachers and directors.

    But Oberlin was at once proscribed by the great bodies of ministers and churches, whose fellowship extended to the south.

    And even Oberlin never so much as contemplated any separation from our unhallowed union with slave-holders.

    Instead of it, under an assumed idea or pretence that the constitution was anti-slavery and not pro-slavery, an assumption that no president, congress nor supreme court nor state legislature nor court ever believed for an hour [see 1941 rebuttal], Oberlin continued loyal to the government, swore by itself or elected rulers to support the constitution, and then kept the oath or made a virtue of perjury and violated it by refusing to return the fugitive slave.

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    And scarcely had the institution reached respectability in the estimation of more declared pro-slavery ecclesiastical associations, north and south, before the Infinite Patience was exhausted,

  • and with the bolts of eternal justice stove down our already blood-besmeared idol, and

  • buried it beneath the untimely graves of half a million men slain in a thousand battles, their massacred commander-in-chief and president of the nation [Lincoln] with his own heart's blood, sealing the sacrifice!
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    CHAPTER XIV.

    SOME ACTS OF THE PRO-SLAVERY APOSTLES—PERSONAL
    ENCOUNTER WITH THE HENNIKER. N.H., CHURCH AND
    SUFFOLK, MASS., ASSOCIATION OF MINISTERS—REV. DR.
    BACON AND SON ON SLAVERY AND WHO ABOLISHED IT—
    THE CHURCH AND CLERGY IN THE MEXICAN WAR.

    It is time to draw this work to a close. It was undertaken with extreme reluctance at the earnest solicitation of those whose wishes it is my delight to obey, even at any cost of personal, sacrifice of my latest years, only if the cause of truth and the demands of history be also subserved. And strict truth and justice to everybody concerned, has been, and shall be to the end, my one constant study and care.

    The next chapter may be called "Acts of the Pro-Slavery Apostles," and will have respect mainly to the connection of the church and clergy of the country with the slave system. Their hostility to the anti-slavery enterprise was not wakened into fierce and general opposition till slavery was not only declared a SIN; such sin as that no slave-holder could be a Christian, nor worthy to be fellowshipped as such, whether south or north.

    The abolitionists insisted that every church and pulpit dictating terms of sacramental communion should hold the man-stealer as just so much greater criminal than the felon of the sheep-fold, as a man is better than a sheep, remembering who He was that asked, "How much better is a man than a sheep?" [Matt. 12:12] And our warrant for this judgment came from the very highest evangelical authority the church could furnish. Long before slavery had reached the pro-

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    portions of 1834, or developed half its prospective cruelties, the General Assembly of the Presbyterian church had officially and authoritively taught [1805], citing as their scripture basis, the first epistle of Timothy, first chapter, ninth and tenth verses:

    "The law is made for manstealers. This crime among the Jews exposed the perpetrators of it to capital punishment. Exodus xxi, 16; and the apostle classes them with sinners of the first rank.

    "The word he uses, in its original import, comprehends all who are concerned in bringing any of the human race into slavery, or in retaining them in it.

    "Stealers of men are all those who bring off slaves or freemen, and keep, sell, or buy them.

    "To steal a freeman, says [Hugo] Grotius [1583-1645], is the highest kind of theft. In other instances we only steal human property, but when we steal or retain men in slavery, we seize those who, in common with ourselves, are constituted, by the original grants, lords of the earth."

    Ed. Note: For more on the "original grant" concept, see
  • Rev. James Rankin, Letters (1823), p 100
  • Rev. Theo. D. Weld, Bible Against Slavery (1837), pp 28-30
  • James Birney, Bulwarks (1840), p 29
  • Lysander Spooner, Slavery (1845), p 14
  • Rev. Parker Pillsbury, Forlorn Hope (1847), p 8
  • Rev. John G. Fee, Non-Fellowship (1849), p 6
  • Rev. John G. Fee, Sinfulness of Slavery (1851), p 10
  • Rev. John G. Fee, Anti-Slavery Manual (1851), p 116
  • Sen. Charles Sumner, Barbarism (1860), p 132.
    For reference to God's continued will that people must follow his original intent, original grant, marriage rules, etc., as per his original revelation, words and actions, at "the beginning," see Matthew 19:8 (divorce example, criticizing religious leaders NOT following original intent, thus misleading others).
  • In 1791, Rev. Jonathan Edwards, D. D., declared and published this:

    "To hold any man in slavery, is to be every day guilty of robbing him of his liberty, or of man-stealing. Fifty years from this time (1791) it will be as shameful for a man to hold a slave as to be guilty of common theft or robbery."

    "And John Wesley [1703-1791], this: "What I have said to slave-traders equally concerns all slave-holders of whatever rank and degree; seeing men-buyers are exactly on a level with men-stealers!

    "Indeed, you say, 'I pay honestly for my goods; and I am not concerned to know how they are come by.'

    "Nay, but you are; you are deeply concerned to know they are honestly come by; otherwise you are partaker with a thief, and are not a jot honester than he.

    "But you know they are not honestly come by; you

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    know they are procured by means nothing near so innocent as picking pockets, house-breaking, or robbery upon the highway.

    "You know they are procured by a deliberate species of more complicated villainy, of fraud, robbery, and murder than was ever practiced by Mohomedans or Pagans. In particular by murderers of all kinds; by the blood of the innocent poured out like water.

    "Now, it is your money that pays the African butcher.

    "You, therefore, are guilty, principally, of all these frauds, robberies and murders."

    Ed. Note: millions of deaths

    With abundance more of similar character and from the same high and representative sources, so that the abolitionists in their position and demand were only holding the church and pulpit to their own once declared and published principles on slavery as well as always on every other acknowledged sin.

    But every one of the great popular denominations apostacized as slavery grew in numbers of its victims and in the terrible crimes, cruelties, tortures and torments, incident to the system, and became directly implicated, if not indeed the very chief of sinners, themselves.

    What then could true Christian abolitionists do, whether ministers or church members, but come out of such fellowship, to avoid the guilt of partaking in the sin? Nothing in all scripture was more sublimely emphatic than the apocalyptic command,

    "Come out of her my people, that ye be not partakers in her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues." [Rev. 18:4. Cf. Ephesians 5:7 and 1 Timothy 5:22.]
    And among the sins charged in that blood-guilty communion was, that its "merchandize" was "in slaves and souls of men" [Rev. 18:13].

    Some of those who composed the associations, who were known as "Come-outers," framed a course of procedure for themselves, and rather excommunica-

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    ted the churches than came out from them. To them the church was a principle, an idea, not a corporation or organization, voting members in or out by majorities, and in many of the sects forbidding women to vote at all on any question, though generally a majority, and frequently a large majority of the membership.

    To such Come-outers the visible church of the New Testament was Christianity made visible in the life and character, whether of one or more, no matter how many, only let purity go before peace and liberty before charity.

    Conservatives held that "peaceful error was better than boisterous truth."

    But the other answered "Nay, not so. Peace if possible, but truth and right at whatever cost."

    Our church in Henniker refused any forward step. Several withdrew from it altogether when a Kentucky slave-holder was invited to preach in the pulpit on Sunday, and administer the sacramental supper. Once when visiting in town a meeting was appointed for him all day on Saturday, in hope that two successive days of his preaching might produce a religious awakening and possibly a revival. No such result, however, followed. But an anti-slavery society was formed in the town, that did good and effective work, some joining from all the churches.

    After absenting myself from the communion service a number of years, engaged constantly in the anti-slavery apostleship, I sent a letter to the church, excommunicating it from my Christian regard and fellowship until it should repent of the sins and shames of slave-holding and bring forth fruits meet for repentance. No notice was taken of me nor my letter till in the autumn of 1846. Then, with a new pastor, who was also clerk of the church, an official order was sent me, signed and countersigned by the clerk, sum-

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    moning me to appear, on a given day, to answer to the charge, not of absence from worship and communion table, but of denying the inspiration of the Bible.

    I had labored with the church publicly and privately for years on the guilt and danger of slave-holding, or of recognizing as Christians or christian ministers the southern slave-breeders or slave-holders, before sending my letter of solemn excommunication. But no similar step, nor any steps, had been taken towards me, by the church or pastor, till the formal call, couched in quite legal phrase, to come into court and plead guilty or not guilty, to a charge foreign as possible from the question, which for years had been in agitation between us.

    My only answer was the following letter, forwarded without unnecessary delay, to the minister, who was also clerk of the church:

    Milford, N. H., Oct. 15, 1846.

    Friend Eden B. Foster—Yours of September 26th was duly received. In reply I would only say that I am not aware of the existence of any Congregational church in Henniker. Certainly none of which I am a member.

    Four or five years ago there was an organization in that town known by that name, myself belonging to it. But that body I excommunicated for its grossly immoral character.

    Since then the individuals comprising it, excepting a very few who have repented, have been to me as "heathen men and publicans" [Matt. 18:17] and so far as their conduct and their influence on the community are to be seen, my estimate of them must be pronounced eminently just.

    I am still laboring for their reformation, and shall rejoice to see signs of penitence; and to forgive with

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    all forbearance and charity so soon as I see hope of genuine repentance [2 Cor 7:10-11] and fruits meet for repentance [Matt. 3:8]. I know of no other business which concerns me and the persons who once composed, with myself, the Congregational church in Henniker. and hasten to subscribe

    Sincerely yours,

    PARKER PILLSBURY.

    What action was taken on this letter, if any, I never knew. If excommunication was voted, or other steps taken, no copy or report was ever sent me, and so there the matter rested.

    But a controversy with the ministry, still more grave, yet remained. I was licensed to preach in Boston by the Suffolk north association of divines, after a pretty severe doctrinal examination, my certificate being signal by Dr. Curtis, president, and Dr. Warren Fay, secretary of the association, both then ministers in Charlestown. My preaching was mainly in New Hampshire and within the bounds of the Hopkinton association.

    Only for remembering them that were in bonds as bound with them, according to the dictates of my own conscience and interpretation of the divine will [Heb. 13:3, I gave great offense to members of the association. But instead of calling on me [as per Matt. 18:15] in any capacity, official or private, they made complaint to the Suffolk association that granted my [ministerial] license. This led to correspondence between that body and myself, of which the following letters are all that concern either history or the present. It will be observed by dates of letters, that all this was some years before my final encounter with the minister and people at Henniker.

    This whole [disfellowshipment] affair to-day [1883] may seem trivial; but to myself and wife, and other near and dear friends, there was mighty meaning in every step, as one after another had to be taken.

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    The summons before the Suffolk association was as below:

    Malden Mass., Feb. 3, 1841.

    Mr. Parker Pillsbury:

    Dear Brother—At a meeting of the Suffolk north association, held in Charlestown, Feb, 2d, 1841, the following preamble and vote were unanimously adopted:

    Whereas, Certain communications have been received by this association, and are now on file, from the Hopkinton association, of New Hampshire, and Mr. Parker Pillsbury, a licentiate of this body, relative to charges preferred by the Hopkinton association against Mr. Pillsbury. Therefore

    Voted, That the case be assigned for consideration and final action, to a meeting of this association, to be held in Boston, at the house of Mr. Blagdon, on Tuesday, the twenty-third day of the present month, at nine o'clock, A.M., when the parties may be fully heard; and that a copy of this vote be communicated by the scribe, both to the Hopkinton association and to Mr. Pillsbury.

    A true copy of record.

    [Attest] A. W. McClure, Scribe.

    Ed. Note: A proper notice of charges includes a "statement or citation of the written regulations . . . said to have been violated [and] a detailed statement of the facts [evidencing / elaborating the alleged violation]," Boilermakers v Hardeman, 401 US 233, 245; 91 S Ct 609, 617; 28 L Ed 2d 10, 21 (1971).
    Note that this letter cites no charges against Rev. Pillsbury, nor facts alleging his guilt of violating some church rule.

    To this arraignment, I immediately responded, to the following effect:

    Concord, N. H., Feb. 20, 1841.

    To the Suffolk North Association of Congregational
    Ministers in Massachusetts
    :

    BRETHREN—Your communication of the third instant was duly received. By it I learn that you have appointed a time and place for consideration of charges preferred against me by the Hopkinton, N. H., association of ministers, and for "final action" on the same.

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    On the course [procedural due process lacking] of the Suffolk association in this matter, I wish to be indulged in a few remarks.

    In the first place, I was not a little surprised at your disposition to hasten the final action of a case so important to me and the parties concerned. In an "extra official" note, appended to your communication, your secretary says,

    "They [the association] thought it their duty to give you the opportunity to substantiate your allegations against the ministers of your region, on the truth of which allegations, you rely for defense against the charges filed against you by the Hopkinton association."

    Now, you must have been aware that to go from town to town over any considerable part of the state, summon witnesses and assemble them at Boston, or to take affidavits and transmit them to the place of meeting, would be a work of much time and labor. You must also have been aware that in no other way could I attempt a defense.

    Had I not, then, good reason to be surprised that your communication informing me that "final action" was to be had on my cause on the twenty-third of February, was not mailed in Malden, Mass., till the fourth of the same month? Is such haste as this common in the courts of law?

    But let me say farther, no charges as yet, have been specified against me. You say in your former communication that the complaint of the Hopkinton association is founded on an article from my pen, published in the Herald of Freedom, "printed at Concord, N. H., October 2d, 1840, containing charges against the clergy that are highly slanderous and unchristian." This is the indictment, and the whole of it.

    Now, does the Suffolk association expect me to assemble witnesses at Boston, to prove every position in

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    that letter touching the clergy? If not, why have they not specified the charges that are "highly slanderous and unchristian?"

    But one word in relation to the general manner of procedure. We have heard much of late in this state of "Congregational usage;" and of "ecclesiastical usage;" and of "ministerial usage." But what shall I call that "usage" which (aside from considerations already noticed), permits a clerical body, to which I do not, never did, and never shall belong, and to which I am in no way, whatever, responsible, beyond that general relation which all christians bear to one another, to pursue a course towards one whom they do not regard as a brother in the ministry, such as the Hopkinton association have pursued toward me?

    Had they no [Matt. 18:15] individual duty to discharge to me alone? [if they thought it wrong of him to denounce their pro-slaveryism as sin.] Or, had the association, in its organized capacity, none? Could they never, as individuals, nor collectively, administer one word of instruction [proving slavery unsinful], rebuke, nor correction?

    When they saw me [supposedly] wandering out of the way [into believing slavery to be sin], was there no one venerable from age or experience, to warn my inexperienced feet? Or, could not the body together give me one word of caution? Why should they, at the very outset, adopt a procedure which they knew must either condemn and banish me unheard, or subject me to such labor and expense for trial as I am utterly unable to meet?

    But they acted as they saw fit; nor am I surprised nor grieved: I had no right nor reason to expect otherwise of a body of [demonized] men, who, when a brother came before them with a complaint against one of their own number, to sustain which complaint, some six or eight of the best members of his own church stood ready, could deliberately vote in a moment after the presentation, to return it to its author, unread and unopened!

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    I have the best of evidence to show that the clergy, as a body, are determined to sustain each other in the crusade against the advocates of the rights of our enslaved fellow men.

    Ed. Note: Example: James Birney's book Bulwarks

    No unimportant part of that evidence is the fact that the Suffolk North Association have signified their intention to take "final action" on the complaint of the Hopkinton Association against me, irrespective of the manner or character of that complaint in three weeks after the determination was formed, and information of it transmitted to the parties concerned.

    I need not repeat here what has already been intimated, that you and the Hopkinton Association also must be aware of the utter impossibility for me to avail myself of the testimony requisite to a fair and full representation of the case, in so short a time.

    But I ask for no continuance [delay]; I am not anxious to prove to you that the great body of the clergy of this state are, and have been, deadly hostile to anything like efficient action for the overthrow of [the sin of] slavery. I deem it more important to establish that fact among those who support them; I mean their pastoral charges. And I am glad to know that the happiest success attends my labors, and those of my faithful coadjutors in the work.

    You will not therefore be surprised to learn that I do not feel called upon to appear before you on the day you have specified for a hearing of my case. I might well say, in the words of Nehemiah to his adversaries,

    "I am doing a great work, so that I cannot come down. Why should the work cease while I leave it and come down to you?" [Neh. 6:3.]

    I should gain little, even could I do all that could be wished. The same

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    work would still have to be done among the people which is required now, and by the same instrumentality, and through the same opposition.

    Rev. Parker Pillsbury "I need not tell you that I have been compelled [by 20 Feb 1841] to excommunicate from my fellowship, most of the ministers of our land for the sin of conniving at American slavery; I do not regard them as Christians, nor Christian ministers.

    Ed. Note: This meant, “ninety-nine hundredths of the Christian ministry in our land [as they] claim that it [slavery] is at least tolerated by the Bible,” says Rev. John G. Fee, Sinfulness of Slavery, 1851), p 3. Note slavers' underlying creationist views, heretical views.
    Patrick Henry (1773) had been shocked by American Churches being pro-slavery.
    Thomas Paine (1774) used the term "pretended Christian" to refer to the pro-slavery ilk.
    Methodist Founder John Wesley (1703-1791) gave an overview.
    Note abolitionist William Lloyd Garrison's analysis of U.S. Clergy: "disgraces to humanity . . . heathenish, filled with apologies for sin and sinners of the worst sort . . . . Bulwarks of Slavery . . . [and] accessories to the MANSTEALERS in the bloodiest of their crimes . . . Oh the rottenness of Christendom." Quoted by Macalester College Prof. James Brewer Stewart, William Lloyd Garrison and the Challenge of Emancipation (Arlington Heights, IL: Harlan Davidson, Inc, 1992), p 91.
    See also abolitionist
  • William Wilberforce, A Practical View of the Prevailing Religious System of Professed Christians, Contrasted with Real Christianity (Boston: J. Bumstead, 1803; reprinted New York: American Tract Society, 1830 & 1839; London: SCM Press, 1958; Portland, Or.: Multnomah Press, 1982; Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson Pub, 1996
  • Michael Griffiths, God's Forgetful Pilgrims: Recalling the Church to Its Reason for Being (Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Erdmans Pub. Co., 1975, aka Cinderella with Amnesia: A Restatement in Contemporary Terms of the Bibilical Doctrine of the Church (London: Inter-Varsity Press, 1975)
  • Prof. José P. Miranda, Comunismo en la Biblia, transl. by Robert Barr, Communism in the Bible (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 1987).
    See also 1 Kings 18:19, citing at Elijah's time, an 850:1 ratio of lying vs honest clergy, 850 liars vs one honest clergyman. Note the continuing existence of false clergymen, 1 Corinthians 10:6 and 2 Corinthians 11:13-15. Cf. Matthew 7:13-23, there are few real Christians, many (most) are fakes, merely professing Christianity Matthew 23:15, 24:4-5, 24:23-24; thus there are many clergymen merely pretending to be Christian Matthew 16:18. Such enter or “stay in it [the ministry] . . . to destroy it [the church]!” says Sinclair Lewis, Elmer Gantry (1927), Chapter VIII, Section II, p 122.
    Gerrit Smith, in Letter (1839), p 36, cited the American people as a whole, due to their hostility to the Seventh Commandment, as "immoral and irreligious."
    "In fact, 'there is no morality of any kind, and if good families exist, as some indeed do, their virtue is the more meritorious, since there are no incentives for good in an environment completely open to evil influences,'" say Profs. Fred Anderson and Andrew Cayton, The Dominion of War: Empire and Liberty in North America, 1500-2000 (New York: Viking, 2005), Chapter 6, p 272. [See context and details.]
    James G. Birney did an 1840 exposé of America's wicked churches.
    Rev. Stephen Foster did an 1843 exposé.
    Rev. William Patton (1846) cited infidel-producing effects caused by lying clergymen who pretended (by eisegesis) that the Bible contains pro-slavery words. (See also background on the creationist heresy.)
    Rev. James Fee (1851) listed traits of slavery incompatible with Bible worship.
    Harriet Beecher Stowe's 1853
  • summary of unchristian Southern church beliefs
  • resultant vile Southern laws.
    Charles Darwin, M.A. (Theol.) in Origin of Species (1859) refuted the slaver position.
    Sen. Charles Sumner, LL.D., (1860) exposed the South's ban on slaves' reading, including of the Bible.
    Prof. Thomas W. Collens exposed the rampant rejection of Bible economic equality principles, such as are shown in, e.g., Acts 2:44-45, Acts 4:32, 34-35, 1 Cor. 1:10, Psalm 133:1, Luke 14:33, etc.
  • "I regret to be compelled to add that even the Suffolk North Association of Ministers, are no exception; nor can I recognize them as vested with any authority to decide who shall, or shall not be licensed to preach the gospel. You have shown yourselves in various ways, to be the friends of the southern oppressor, rather than of the opprest.

    "Not many of you have even established the monthly concert of prayer for the enslaved, to intercede with God on their behalf. You have done well for the heathen abroad, perhaps, but have neglected three millions of heathen at the doors of your own sanctuaries.

    Most of you oppose directly, the agitation of [education on] the subject of slavery, in any manner, among your people. You are in full fellowship and communion with the slave-holding ministers at the south, and their more guilty apologists at the north.

    "For ten years we have been laboring to awaken an interest in the churches in behalf of the bleeding slave. Labor enough has been done in New England to have made every church, as a church, the inflexible foe of oppression, as it exists at the south, had it not been for the mighty opposition that has been constantly thrown in the way by the pulpit.

    "It has come to be a mere truism that the firmest pillars of the bloody Moloch are the professed ministers of Jesus Christ; and in no part of these states have those ministers shown themselves more subservient to the will of slave-breeding and slave-

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    holding ministers and others, than in Boston and vicinity.

    With your blood-stained feet on the necks of three millions of your prostrate brethren, you are deliberately talking of "censure" and "resumption" of my "license" because I have espoused faithfully their cause!

    "Recreant should I be to the interests of my Redeemer's kingdom, to recognize such men as ministers of Christ. I know full well how the warning will be received; but still I warn you to repent.

    Ed. Note: Most churches and clergy did NOT repent, and still have not.

    "God has a controversy with you on this awful sin of enslaving millions of immortal beings as yourselves, compelling them into absolute heathenism, concubinage, adultery; robbing them of everything, wives, children, all the endearing relations of life, manhood, womanhood, with all else, only to gratify the cupidity of an unrighteous and cruel master-hood.

    "Your Christianity has less of humanity in it than has the religion of the Seminole savage! he befriends the slave and welcomes him to his wigwam: you, or most of you, and multitudes under your pastoral charge, are deaf as adders to his woes.

    "Search the heathen world, ancient and modern; you shall look in vain for a system of greater abominations, more horrible cruelties than American slavery; and yet you baptise and sanctify it, and admit it to full sacramental communion and fellowship.

    "The ancient Romans with hearts of steel, had their god of war; the ferocious Vandal had his god of vengeance; but none of their high places ever shewed an altar to the fell demon of slavery. Never did the Nine Sisters hold fond dalliance with a fiend so foul; never was Apollo's golden lyre tuned to his praise; never did the wild harp of northern minstrelsy in all its long buried melodies, indite one hymn to the blood-

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    swollen vampire.

    "Never was altar reared to such divinity till the Christian slave chain was forged, and the Christian coffle formed; till torturing evangelical thumb-screws were invented, and human flesh had hissed and broiled beneath the red-hot branding iron, and the one eternal God, in the person of his children, his own image and likeness, was bought and sold in the shambles with the beasts that perish!

    "And now you, grave and venerable ministers, demand of me to fall down and reverence and worship your blood-besmeared idol, on pain of "censure," or resumption [revocation] of the license with which you invested me as a preacher of the gospel; and as logical consequence, expulsion from the church on earth, and the society of the redeemed in heaven! Brethren, you know you can not deny what I say.

    "For three hundred years, your Christianity has been tearing at the vitals of Africa, like vultures, snatching away from her bosom her poor sons and daughters in myriads, to supply the Christian slave-markets of this and other nations. Her wailings have been borne on the trade-winds, on all the winds, to the ends of the earth.

    "And yet to this hour, doctors of divinity dare doubt, dare openly deny that slavery is sin! and even such as feign to believe it sin, make themselves, by a strange silence or open connivance, more guilty, if possible, or certainly more dangerous, than those who deny or doubt.

    "I repeat my denial that what is taught and professed by the great body of clergy in this nation as Christianity is not Christianity at all. I confine myself in this letter wholly to slavery. To American chattel slavery.

    "There are other accounts to be considered when slavery is overthrown. Let your intimated "censure" and resumption of "license" be carried

    -376-

    into full execution. I shall still preach the gospel of Christ, and by his grace wash my hands from all participation in your guilt on the awful crimes and cruelties of slavery, and in the last day be a swift witness against you, unless you repent.

    "Brethren, regard this letter as my solemn excommunication of you, and my work with you is done.

    "I go now to the lost sheep on the mountains to unfold to them the treasures of the gospel. And I shall tell them, as I have done before, except your righteousness exceed the righteousness of most of the professed ministers of Christ around you, you can in no case enter into the kingdom of heaven. [Matt. 5:20]

    "And when they, and you, and I, stand at the tribunal of God with assembled worlds, the down-trodden and sorrow-stricken slave in the vast congregation, it shall be known who has served God and who has not. And justice shall be meted out to us all.

    "Yours, waiting that great event,

    PARKER PILLSBURY.

    At a subsequent meeting of the [pro-slavery] Suffolk North Association my [ministerial] "license" was resumed [revoked], as had been before intimated and threatened.

    Ed. Note: Much in so-called 'Christianity' cannot be understood except by noting results of the many years of persecution by Roman Emperors. "Christians are a confused and vicious sect," said the Roman writer Porphyry (c. 232 C.E. – c. 304 C.E.) in Adversus Christianos (Against the Christians).
    A succession of Emperors knew how to handle such a sect. The most effective persecution was the last one, the one by Emperor Diocletian [284 C.E. - 305 C.E.]. The persecution during Diocletian's term for all practical purposes achieved his goal of exterminating original Christianity. His was "the last Imperial persecution . . . a resolute, determined, systematic effort to abolish the Christian Name," says a widely known reference, Halley's Bible Handbook, 24th Ed. (1965), p 762. “Extincto nomine Christianorum”—Diocletian, on his success, meaning, 'I did abolish Christianity.'
    How? In sum, seriatim, Roman 'secret police' infilitrated, 'joined,' took over, altered, discredited, abolished, replaced the Christianity and doctrines of the first three centuries, with nothing much left but 'the name of Jesus.'
    The new 'Christian' doctrine became civil religion, i.e., emperor worship aka caesaropapism. See definition, New Catholic Encyclopedia, Vol 2, p 851.
    'Emperor-worship' means the church and clergy support whatever the government teaches, whatever politicians specify, whatever society has as customs.
    For definitions and background on caesaropapism, see, e.g.,
  • New Catholic Dictionary
  • Encyclopædia Britannica
  • Dictionary Definition
  • Indexlistus
  • Columbia Encyclopedia (Justinian Example).

  • That caesaropapist policy defends politicians no matter how oppressive and genocidal is notorious. For example, see this sycophant wording as a matter of their infallible rigid unbending doctrine, "mental paralysis": "we [alleged Christians] have simply to do with the government in fact, and its acting head [politicians] as representing to us, however imperfectly in the civil sphere, the government of Christ. Our subjection [to politicians] takes the form of obeying the [politician] laws, paying taxes, lending our influence on the side of authority," and "Christians were really the greatest friends of [law and] order, and it was not only their interest but their recognized duty to occupy no doubtful position toward the Roman state [government]," say Very Rev. H. D. M. Spence, M.A., D.D. and Rev. Joseph S. Exell, M.A., eds., Vol. 22, The Pulpit Commentary, I Peter (Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Erdmans Pub Co, 1950), p 122. [Such demonized clergy were likewise sychophantic to slavery, to wars, and to Hitler].
    Christianity was abolished by the persecutions. "The Church at Jerusalem . . . was obliged to disperse. . . . the great community, with its meals in common, its diaconal services, its varied exercises ceased thenceforth, and was never again reconstructed upon its first model. It had lasted three or four years," says Prof. Ernest Renan, The Apostles (New York, Carleton; Paris, Michel Levy Frères, 1866), p 152.
    Subsequent clergy and churches pretend that the subsequent quite different system, different in doctrines and practice, is still 'Christianity' — no matter how contrary to First Century Christianity. Bottom line: They scam their members. "Christian enthusiasm for the state, its wars, and its politicians is an affront to the Saviour, contrary to Scripture, and a demonstration of the profound ignorance many Christians have of history," says Laurence M. Vance, Ph.D., Christianity and War and Other Essays Against the Warfare State (Vance Publications, 1 January 2005).
    Such so-called "Christians" continue ancient pagan notions. They defend "favorite teachers."
    "For fifty years after St. Paul's life a curtain hangs over the church, through which we strive vainly to look; and when at last it rises about 120 AD with the writings of the earliest church fathers, we find a church in many aspects very different from that in the days of St. Peter and St. Paul," says Jesse Lyman Hurlbut in The Story of the Christian Church (1918), p. 41. Such subsequnt "Christianity did not destroy paganism, it adopted it; Christianity was the last great creation of the ancient pagan world," says historian William Durant, The Story of Civilization, Caesar and Christ, Part III (1944), p. 595, referring to fake "Christianity." This latter "Christianity" "grew by the absorption of pagan faith and ritual," p. 575.
    "Is Christianity, as now usually practised and taught, the same thing as the religion of Jesus? I maintain emphatically that it is NOT," says Rev. Dennis Hird, Jesus (London: Clarion Press, 1908), p 1.
    First Century Christians would not recognize the fake "Christianity," post-Diocletian 'Christianity.' There's nothing much left but the name. It is in fact 'Emperor/government worship.'
    You may see allegations that a subsequent emperor, Constantine (288 C.E. - 337 C.E.) "converted" to Christianity, upon becoming Emperor (306-337).
    No. Constantine faked it. See Upton Sinclair, Profits of Religion (1917), § "Christ and Caesar." Constantine was quite young, about 18, and wanted to be Emperor so bad he'd war on anybody and would say anything. He was a typical politician believing in nothing but getting himself into office.
    Constantine was son of Constantius, a Roman Army officer who became one of Diocletian's two deputy-emperors.
    Little Constantine was raised in in that type setting, a pagan military and imperial household.
    When Diocletian left office by retiring in 305, Constantine's father Constantius became emperor Constantius I.
    Roman emperors were not hereditary as in a normal monarchy. There was no particular basis for expectation that Constantine would 'inherit' the job—especially so as his father died almost immediately, in 306.
    But, to seize power, Constantine during "Civil Wars" [306 C.E. - 324 C.E.], killed off other claimants to the throne one by one until none were left surviving.
    Constantine claimed to have converted to Christianity, while the heathen Diocletian was still alive! and could, as still popular, return to office if he wished!
    Once in office with no enemies left alive, Constantine [324 C.E. - 337 C.E.] showed his true colors, that he was a Diocletianist. His allegedly being "baptized," he did not do, until on death-bed, i.e., remained heathen all his term (while false "Christians" pretend otherwise!)
    Here are examples of the Constantine brand of "Christianity":
  • His "love of luxury and pomp," included "neglecting public works" so much so that an area "drainage system failed" causing flooding, says Justo L. Gonzalez, Ph.D., The Story of Christianity (San Francisco: HarperCollins Pub, 1984), vol 1, p 114.
  • "Frequent and extravagant shows in the circus gained the support of those who preferred violence and blood--the barbarian captives thus sacrificed were so many that a chronicler of the times affirms that the shows lost some of their interest because the beasts grew tired of killing," p 114.
  • Constantine planned for wars "for many years" in advance, p 114, feeling "that he would eventually go to war with" other claimants for the throne, such as Licinius, p 115.
  • "Constantine wished to go to war with his [rival], but was able to make his rival appear as the aggressor," p 116.
  • "The main reason for conflict was still the ambition of [Constantine and rival Licinius] which broke out in the question of what titles and honors were to be given to their sons," p 117.
  • "In 322, Constantine invaded Licinius' territories," p 117.
  • Once Constantine had conquered Licinius, he "was murdered," p 117.
  • "Constantine would reign for the next thirteen years, until his death in 337. . . . quite a few people were condemned to death for real or supposed conspiracies against [Constantine]--among them his oldest son, Crispus," p 118.
  • "Constantine had not sought absolute power for the mere pleasure of it. He also dreamed, like Decius and Diocletian before him, of restoring the ancient glory of Rome," p 118.
  • He set "the most famous statue . . . the image of [the god] Apollo . . . in the middle of the city [Constantinople] . . . reputed to be the largest such monolith in the world . . . a new head, that of Constantine [was] placed on it," p 120.
  • "Constantine's [alleged] conversion was very different from that of other Christians. At that time, people who were converted were put through a long process of discipline and instruction, in order to make certain that they understood and lived their new faith, and then they were baptized. Their bishop became their guide and shepherd as they sought to discover [for themselves vs, being taught from the Bible] the implications of their faith in various situations in life," pp 120-121.
  • "Constantine's case was very different [he] never placed himself under the direction of Christian teachers or bishops [he] reserved the right to determine his own religious practices, and even to intervene in the life of the church. . . . . Repeatedly, even after his [alleged] conversion, he took part in pagan rites in which no Christian would participate . . . he was not technically a Christian, for he had not been baptized. In fact, it was only on his deathbed that he was baptized," p 121.
  • His "understanding of the Christian message was meager." His alleged Christianity "did not prevent the emperor from serving other gods," p 122.
  • "Constantine seems to have thought [of] the [Christian God that] the other gods, although subordinate, were nevertheless real and relatively powerful. Thus, on occasion, he would consult the oracle of Apollo, accept the title of High Priest that had traditionally been the prerogative of [pagan] emperors, and partake of all sorts of pagan ceremonies . . . Constantine was a shrewd politician," p 122.
  • Thus "almost to his dying day Constantine continued functioning as the High Priest of paganism. After his death, the three sons who succeeded him did not oppose the [pagan Roman] Senate's move to have him declared a god. Thus the ironic anomoly occurred, that Constantine . . . became one of the pagan gods," p 123.
  • "Constantine's impact on the life of the church was such that it was [is] still felt as late as the twentieth century," p 124.
  • "Christian worship began to be influenced by imperial protocol. Incense, which was used as a sign of respect for the emperor, began appearing in Christian churches. Officiating ministers, who until then had worn everyday clothes, began dressing in more luxurious garments. Likewise, a number of gestures indicating respect, which were normally made before the emperor, now became part of Christian worship. . . . Eventually, the relics of saints and of New Testament times were said to have miraculous powers," p 125.
  • "While these developments were taking place, many leaders of the church viewed them with disfavor, and tried to prevent superstitious extremes . . . But such preaching was unequal to the task, for people were flocking into the church in such numbers that there was little time to prepare them for baptism, and even less to guide them in the Christian life once they had been baptized." Even church building design changed, "contrasted with the simplicity of" prior years, p 126.
    See also Douglas S. Winnail, "Early Christianity in Europe's Western Isles," 4 Tomorrow's World (#6) (Nov-Dec 2002).
    For more background, see "The Origin of Christianity. -- Its Transformation on Attaining Imperial Power. -- Its Relations to Science" (Chapter II in the book, History of the Conflict Between Religion and Science by John William Draper, M.D., LL.D. (1811-1882) Late Professor, Univ of New York] (London: Kegan Paul, Trench, Thrübner & Co. Ltd., 1910).
    One Roman Emperor title was "dominus et deus ('lord and god'), a position to be worshipped. Constantine continued that belief and practice in the Eastern Roman Empire.
    In the Western side, he had "Christianity" follow the 'Emperor-Worship' aka caesaropapism concept, merely less blatantly. He continued the practice of ignoring and defying the 'original grant' of Genesis 1:28, and defy that power-limiting concept across-the-board.
    Constantine and, soon thereafter, the Roman secret police agent, Sgt. ("Saint") Augustine (354 C.E. - 430 C.E.), glorified the human government, monarchy, the "state."
    The sinister Sgt. Augustine had the role of infilitrating the Christian survivors, pretending to be a "convert," then using his wordsmith word manipulation skills to alter, revise, skew, distort, misrepresent, and repeal and rescind Christian doctrines of the first three centuries, into "emperor-worship" aka caesaropapism style concepts.
    Sgt. Augustine reversed Christian teaching against war, by substituting the heathen "just war" notion of the pagan Roman philosopher Marcus T. Cicero (106 B.C. - 43 B.C.). "The just war ethic [is] based on Roman thought," says The Dictionary of Bible and Religion, "War" by Prof. Charles S. McCoy, General Editor William H. Gentz (Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1986), p 1099. A "just war" in reality means any war the emperor, government, want. Eventually this doctrine-reversal led to multiple world wars. (Changing Bible commands is, of course specifically forbidden (Lev. 18:3-5; Deut 4:4 & 12:32 (Commandments 14-15); Rev. 22:18-19, but the Bible rules of course meant nothing to Sgt. Augustine.)
    "Just War Theories have been around for about 2000 years. However, they did not infect Christianity until three hundred years after Jesus' Resurrection. St. Ambrose and St. Augustine were their original carriers into the Church. However, in fairness it must be acknowledged that by the time these two politically powerful bishops released the perpetually mutating moral virus of CJWT into the Christian community, the Church by its choices in favor of acquiring wealth and political power had lost just about all of the spiritual immune system that protected it from the moral pathogen of righteous homicidal violence. The hope then of this little book is that it can serve as a partial but effective antidote for the catastrophic spiritual malaise of divinely supported homicidal violence that has metastasized throughout the entire catholic Church. The only complete cure, of course, is for the Church to unreservedly embrace the truth of the Message of the Nonviolent Jesus Christ. Hopefully this book, by exposing the intellectual and moral vacuousness of CJWT, will bring the hour of that embrace closer," says Rev. Emmanuel Charles McCarthy, author of Christian Just War Theory: The Logic of Deceit (2003).
    Sgt. Augustine replaced other Christian doctrines also, as he "adds . . . his own thought," made "development and advance of dogma," and had "new theories" and "new views." Luther therefore said, "Augustine has often erred, he is not to be trusted."
    For example, Augustine substituted amillenialism for premillenialism. He substituted the bizarre "well-ordered heart" notion (a notion distinct from adherence to actual Bible commands). Sgt. Augustine was a 15-year fornicator with a woman not his wife, and this notion of his (contrary to, e.g., 1 Corinthians 5 precedent) set the stage for the invention of medieval-invented "rules of life," including detailed rules on allowed and banned sexual positions for married couples! The Bible of course banned adding commandments (Lev. 18:3-5; Deut 4:4 & 12:32 (Commandments 14-15); Rev. 22:18-19), and specifically opposed this type of rules (Colossians 2:21-23), calling them meaningless "touch not, taste not, handle not" doctrines, diverting attention off real truths.
    The caesaropapist "just war" heresy that Sgt. Augustine adopted from the pagan Roman Cicero, was carefully written manipulatively to allow oppressive rulers to wage war, but not oppressed peoples to defend themselves. He invented the unbiblical, pro-war heretical notions "that in order for [a war] to be [just] certain conditions must be fulfilled. The first is the purpose of the war must be just . . . The second is that a just war must be waged by properly instituted [politician] authority [a principle] applied by the powerful in order to claim that they had the right to make war on the powerless, but that the opposite was not true . . . . the motive of love must be central," says Justo L. Gonzalez, Ph.D., The Story of Christianity (San Francisco: HarperCollins Pub, 1984), vol 1, p 214. These type criteria of course allow all wars for any and all reasons, as politicians always say the criteria are met!! For example, on slavery, "all sorts of excuses were found for supposedly just wars," p 409, including "incited wars between different . . . . tribes," p 410.
    The pro-war heresy continues, e.g., by Darrell Cole, When God Says War is Right, and Darrell Cole and Alexander F. C. Webster, The Virtue of War: Reclaiming the Classic Christian Traditions East & West. (For background, click here.)
    See also the analysis by Prof. John Howard Yoder, Th.D. (1927-1997), When War is Unjust: Being Honest in Just-War Thinking (Augsburg, 1984) and the summary from The Christian Century, 13 March 1991, pp. 295-298, disproving the "just war" heresy by, e.g., citing politicians telling contradictory versions simultaneously so as to appease different groups, thus refuting the various criteria supposedly enabling analyses re "just wars."
    "Many Christian thinkers believe that the Church went astray at the time of Constantine in dropping its 300-year history of absolute pacifism. They see the Just War Criteria developed by Augustine [adopted from the pagan Cicero] and refined by Thomas Aquinas as an accommodation to Caesar, not faithfulness to Jesus," says Archbishop Robert M. Bowman.
    By eliminating genuine Bible truths, people become more amenable to whatever the emperor, politicians, secular government, wants.
    Fake "Christians" (actually caesaropapists) even invented the nonsensical "divine right of kings" fable, carrying emperor/government-worship to that extreme!
    Sgt. Augustine went so far in destroying Christian doctrines as to revoke the notion of God as source, in favor of the emperor-worship doctrine of the "state," as the source of legitimate political power.
    That monarchical view that government, not God, is the source of rights, is a Roman-emperor-oriented view refuted by both
  • the Bible's "God is the source" and "original grant" concepts; and
  • by modern democracy! Modern democracy cites 'the people' as the legitimate power source.
    See, for example, the U.S. Constitution's Preamble, saying that the government does not create itself (self-creation is evolution doctrine!); government is NOT its own creator; but instead, "we the people" create the government. How? by delegating "our" power.
    Contrary to the Emperor-worship view, contrary to the caesaropapists view, contrary to secret-police agent Sgt. Augustine's view, contrary to fake "Christianity," the government ("state") is NOT the power source, is not its own power source, does not create itself. Without delegation from "we the people," the state has NO power! indeed does not even exist!
    Of course, "we the people" cannot delegate power "we" don't have in the first place.
    Lysander Spooner, Unconstitutionality (1845), p 14, elaborates, notes that "we the people" CANNOT delegate to government, power "we" ourselves lack! We can't delegate power "we" don't have. The limits on the power of "we" include those limits set by "natural right," "natural justice," i.e., the "original grant." "We" cannot delegate to others, more power than "we" have been granted.
    Nonetheless, despite the modern 'democratic' refutation of the "state" as the origin of its power, that old caesaropapist 'Emperor-worship' notion of the "state" as power-origin, is still obsessively adhered to nonetheless by many so-called "Christian" clergy in "democratic" societies. Such emperor-worshipping clergy are oblivious to the culture-bias, the pro-monarchy bias, of Roman secret police agent Sgt. Augustine.
    We see the 'emperor worship' concept (and the "divine right of kings" notion) during the Middle Ages, the World Wars, and to present. We see so-called "Christians" starting most if not all the world wars, killing other "Christians"—German, French, English, American, etc. Each country's "Christians" were following the commands of their "emperor," their government. The clergy said "amen," the troops are "our" troops, we're "patriots," meaning "we [clergy and members] are [while faking being Christian, really] emperor-worshippers."
    See pertinent analyses citing genuine Bible-based actions, by
  • Rev. George B. Cheever, Discourse (June 1856), pp 33-38
  • Charles Sumner, The True Grandeur of Nations (Boston: 4 July 1845), pp 45-47, 54-60; and in On War (Boston: 28 May 1849), p 238
    See also Edward Crankshaw, The Fall of the House of Habsburg (New York: Viking Press, 1963), citing the "divine right" notion, pp 50-51; the corrupt triple alliance of Army, Church and Nobility, p 10; and the ease of starting wars, p 405.
    "Emperor-worshippers" pretending to be "Christian" oft make brazenly false remarks like, "my country's constitution (fundamental law) is based on the Ten Commandments or Bible," or some such-holy-sounding term! They say such lies, to aid and abet their governments in deceiving and scamming their people.
    "As for the peoples, they were nothing at all . . . except cannon fodder. No government ever . . . hesitated to deceive them [; each government] took it for granted that they [the citizens] would [in "Christian patriotism"] let themselves be butchered in unlimited quantities [millions!] when the game of power politics [meant] war." —Konne Zilliacus, M.P., Mirror of the Past: A History of Secret Diplomacy (New York: A. A. Wyn, 1946).
    Clergymen pretending to be Christian—support wars, for ANY cause, e.g., the 1914-1918 World War!!!—a war of aggression! Re the underlying "national patriotism, religion sanctioned it."—Carlton J. H. Hayes (Hist. Prof, Columbia), A Brief History of the Great War (New York: Macmillan Co, 1920), p 3.
    These fake Christians also tortured and murdered people into becoming 'Christian' like themselves. They ignored Christ's actual saying, which was to 'preach,' not beat and torture! These Satanists pretending to be "Christian," still support torture, see Ray McGovern "'Christians' Wink at Torture" (ConsortiumNews.com, 1 August 2009).
    What followed after the 300's C.E., and still continues, was essentially the old pagan Emperor worship, meaning, so-called 'Christians' voided God's civil laws [those for running society until Messiah comes]; they voided them, repealed them, annuled them, abolished them, slandered them as a "curse," declared them (!!) 'done away.'
    So-called Christians (in reality, emperor worshippers, government worshippers), insist that people must use only those laws written by politicians, however contrary to God's laws, however vile, corrupt, immoral, bribe-ridden.
    These fake Christians invented a rebel Jesus. This rebel Jesus, instead of supporting his Father's Bible law as He said to do, John 14:15, 21, 23-24 and Revelation 22:14, and fulfilling it as he said, Matthew 5:17, instead rebelled!, Luke 19:27, by doing away with the Bible commands, Society Management Laws! In contrast, the 'real Jesus' of the Bible conformed to the commandments, to His Father's Will, John 4:34, John 5:30, John 6:38. (Background; Context).
    Note the various types of laws, e.g., moral, ceremonial, and society-management. (See “The Teaching of Jesus,” by Prof. Harris Franklin Rall, in Abingdon Bible Commentary (1929), pp 904-913 at 905).
  • This means that [1] "some aspects . . teach God's moral and ethical norms. [2] Some aspects . . . instruct . . . in . . . the ceremonial law. [3] Still other dimensions . . . teach implications of the moral ceremonial law in their home and community," says David Horton, Ed., The Portable Seminary (Bloomington MN: Bethany House, 2006), § Hebrew Literature, p 215.
  • "There are three kinds of laws in the Old Testament: [1] the moral law, which tells all people their duty toward God and other people; [2] the ceremonial law, which regulated the religious practices in the Old Ttestament; and [3] the political law, which was the state [national, federal] law of the Israelites,” says Martin Luther, Th.D., in Luther's Preface to the Small Catechism § 14, "How did God give His law?" (1529).
    Those commands, those Bible Society Management Laws, included laws on
  • loans (Commandments 170-175), lender [contrary to Ancient World practice elsewhere] cannot lawfully charge interest aka usury (Exodus 22:25; Leviticus 25:36-37; Deuteronomy 23:19; Nehemiah 5:7, 10; Psalms 15:5; Proverbs 28:8; Isaiah 24:2; Jeremiah 15:10; Ezekiel 18:8, 13, and 17; Ezekiel 22:12; James 2:6, and James 5:1) (details) (commands pursuant to Exodus 20:9 and 20:17, and Deuteronomy 5:13 and 5:21; re the modern era, cf. Matthew 24:12,   2 Timothy 3:1,   Anti-Foreclosure Article (9 July 2008), and "The Sum of the Eighth Commandment," by Edward Fisher (1627-1655).

        In the New Testament era, charging interest became even further impossible, as “not a single one said anything was his," Acts 4:32, with everyone having everything in common, Acts 2:44-45 and 4:32, 34-35. That state of having "all things common" for "distribution . . . unto every man according as he had need," Acts 2:44-45, 4:32, precludes usury.   Christ's command, "Every one of you who does not renounce all he has cannot be my disciple," Luke 14:33, likewise precludes usury.

        "By [that term] the Middle Ages [Church] meant [the Bible meaning of] any interest charge whatever. 'Usury,' said [Saint] Ambrose, 'is whatever is added to the capital [original loan amount]' . . . the Third Council 631of the Lateran (1179) . . . decreed 'that manifest usurers shall not be admitted to communion, nor, if they die in sin, to Christian burial; and no priest shall accept their alms . . . Gregory IX [(1227-1241) upheld] the conception of usury as any receipt of any profit on a loan," says historian William Durant, The Story of Civilization, Part IV: The Age of Faith (1950), Chapter XXIV, pp. 630-631. In the United States, see, e.g., "How Big Banks Victimize Our Democracy" (22 June 2012). Nations such as Greece (1826), Honduras (1873) and Russia (1918) have stopped payment on the national debt, say Economics Professors Carmen M. Reinhart and Kenneth S. Rogoff, This Time is Different: Eight Centuries of Financial Folly (Princeton University Press, 2009), Part I, Chapter 1, § 6, "External Debt Crises," pp 12-13. An "odious debt," "one that served to enrich the clique in power, rather than improving the living conditions of the people," is "illegitimate" so can be cancelled, says Razmig Keucheyan, "The French Are Right: Tear Up Public Debt" (The Guardian, 9 June 2014). "[I]n 2008 Ecuador declared 70% of its debt illegitimate.")

    Related Bible commandments and principles include the following:

  • lender cannot take a 'mortgage,'   'security' or 'pledge' such as on personal property (Exodus 22:25-26, Commandments 176-180)
  • substantial land-ownership (acreage) for all families, combined with general ban on permanent land sales (Leviticus 25:23, Commandment 267)
  • debt cancellation every seven years, Deuteronomy 15:1-11 and 31:10, even when this meant that much of the principal would not be repaid! (Commandments 217-218). See also Jack Clark, Esq., Christian Economics.
  • a simultaneous seven-year cycle of 'vacation' from work, a 'land sabbath' (Exodus 25:2-7; Deuteronomy 15:1-15, Commandments 212-215, pursuant to the Genesis 2:15 concept of maintaining the land and promoting soil absorption properties thus serving purposes such as prevention of soil erosion, sediment-buildup in rivers, and flooding.   For background, see, e.g., Flood (PBS Nova, 26 March 1996) re the Midwest flood of 2003; cf. likewise in June 2008. and Kathlee Freeman, "Dirt in Danger: How Soil Around the World is Threatened" (Common Dreams, 30 October 2014)).
  • maintenance of the divine plan of economic equality via a 'Jubilee' economic system precluding (banning, overruling) concentrations of land / wealth in the hands of a minority (Numbers 26:52-56; Leviticus 25:8-17; Isaiah 5:8 (Commandments 221-226; see also Upton B. Sinclair, The Profits Of Religion (1917), § 3.17, absent the cyclic Jubilee, "no property-right can possibly trace back to any other basis than force [violence, illegitimacy].")
  • the Jubilee economic equality system preventing both poverty and disproportionate wealth, instead, near equality of wealth for all, 1 Kings 10:21 and 27 and 2 Chronicles 1:15 (see details, Rev. Theodore D. Weld, Bible Against Slavery (New York: Am Anti-Slavery Society, 1837), and Lee Van Ham, Reading the Bible Economically (San Diego: Jubilee, 2008)),
  • inheritance,
  • divorce,
  • non-return of fugitive servants, Deut. 23:15-16 (Commandments 200-201)),
  • pro-active crime prevention laws,
  • prisons not allowed, instead only "cities-of-refuge," Numbers 35:6, 11-15, 25-28, and 32, and Joshua 20:2-3, and 21:13, 21, 27, 32, and 38 (Commandment 294)
  • family togetherness,
  • pro-active health laws for disease prevention purposes (e.g., the sewer system command, Deuteronomy 23:12-14, Commandments 609-610) pursuant to principles cited in, e.g., Exodus 15:26 and Deuteromy 7:15 and 28:60 (See background.)
  • pro-active dietary laws, Leviticus 11 and Deuteronomy 14 (Commandments 143-169), see the Scofield Reference Bible (New York: Oxford Univ Press, 1909, 1917, 1937, 1945), p 139, commenting on Leviticus 11, "The dietary regulations of the covenant people must be regarded primarily as sanitary [health-promoting]. Israel, it must be remembered, was a nation living on the earth under a theocratic government. Of necessity, the divine legislation concerned itself with the social as well as with the religious life of that people." God was their "Yahweh Ropheka," Surgeon General, Exodus 15:26. Following God's Surgeon General type guidance, not eating what pagans eat, people were conspicuously healthier, in a matter of days, Daniel 1:8-16.
    Sickness was rare among the Hebrews pursuant to obedience to the Bible health laws cited in Leviticus 11:1-47 and Deuteronomy 14:1-20. Said laws followed God's pro-health intent/purpose, 3 John 2. God promised Israel less ill-health than the diet-laws-violating and tobacco-using Egyptians, Exodus 15:26, Deuteronomy 7:15. Daniel put this system to the test in Daniel 1, by insisting on following these commandments. Living the Bible way revealed conspicuous better health in a mere 10 days, Daniel 1:14-15.
    Of course, if someone were somehow to become ill, could always pray, ask the priests/prophets for healing. 2 Kings 1:3 and 6, and 2 Kings 5:1-19.
    “The [Bible] emphasis was now [some 14 centuries B.C.E.] laid on the prevention of disease rather than its cure. Moses may well be spoken of as the father of preventive medicine. In the medical enactments of the Pentateuch, social hygiene was elevated to the level of a science, and the precepts of the Mosaic era survive to the present as a model of sanitary and hygienic insight.”—The Interpreter's Dictionary of the Bible, Vol. 2 (Abingdon Press, 1984), article "Healing," p. 542. Ancient Egypt and Babylon were noted for their medical treatments and physicians, whereas Ancient Israel was not. Reason: The Bible Law approach to illness was preventive in nature, in sharp contrast to the approach taken in such nations and cultures around Israel. Ancient Israel emphasized prevention, thus assured little or disease, Deuteronomy 7:15, whereas Ancient Egypt and Babylon emphasized after-the-factism, i.e., treatment.
  • For more details, click here.
  • The Bible's economic laws enforce the basic commandments against coveting and stealing, which in turn are subsets of the even more basic commandments of 'loving God' and 'loving thy neighbor.' God defines in what direction the laws must operate, for example, lenders are precluded from coveting interest, and even principal, when loans were near the seven-year cycle point.
  • The Bible Society Management Laws,   Deuteronomy 17:18, tantamount to a National Constitution, directed the head of government to prepare and maintain a copy for permanent reference and daily use, pursuant to the fact that these laws were for running society, not (as so many clergymen allege) to get people saved, to heaven! For background, see , e.g., Jack Clark, Esq., Christian Economics.
  • Pursuant to 2 Corinthians 2:11, people are not to be "ignorant of Satan's devices." Said "devices" are schemes, methods, means, techniques, products whereby lust is conceived and produces sin (James 1:15). Such sins include alcoholism, 90% related to tobacco. And see fuller list.
  • While people cannot save others, grant others the Holy Spirit, people by enforcing the Bible Society Management Laws can eliminate many such harmful "devices," e.g., tobacco. Of course, this is also true re war, to eliminate weapons (Isaiah 2:4,   Joel 3:10,   Micah 4:3, beat swords into plowshares).
  • The divine goal is shown in Isaiah 11:9, Isaiah 65:25 (neither hurting nor destroying in all His holy mountain [Earth]). This goal is achieved via adherence to the Bible Society Management Laws.
    A major function of these laws is to prevent a predatory economic system enabling the strong to prey on the weak. These laws prevent typical societal evils such as recurring unemployment, economic cycles of recessions and depressions. They prevent crime, big business, homelessness, institutionalized banking, economic disparities, etc. They prevent inequities such as are described in articles such as by Teresa Tritch, "The Rise of the Super-Rich" (The New York Times, Wednesday, 19 July 2006).
  • These laws, like the law of gravity, result in severe consequences when defied. Such defiance tempts God, Matthew 4:7, and must not be done. See, e.g., Genesis 19:4-7 (opposing assault); Psalm 72:1-4 (crushing oppressors); Psalm 113:4-7 (re the downtrodden); Proverbs 22:22-23 (destroying oppressors); Jeremiah 7:5-7 (anti-oppression); Ezekiel 16:49-50 (anti-apathy re others in need, with warning re Sodom, Ezekiel 16:4, e.g., its oppressing the poor and needy, hence, warranting destruction, Genesis 19:24-25); Ezekiel 34:16 (destruction of oppressors); Amos 4:1-3 (destroying oppressors); Amos 5:11-13 (anti-oppression); Malachi 3:5 (anti-oppression); Matthew 25:45-46 (destruction of the apathetic); and 2 Corinthians 10:5 (knocking down the self-exalted).
    “True compassion, is more than flinging a coin to a beggar; it comes to see that an edifice which produces beggars needs restructuring.”—Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. (He means, deal with the causes, to prevent the effects. Above, we see the Bible Society Management Laws that prevent poverty and other social ills. Eliminate the cause; the effect disappears. “Sublatâ causa, tollitur effectus: Otez la cause, l'effet disparaît”—Eliminate the cause; the effect disappears.)
    For more on modern pretended Christianity, one that (a) rejects commandments, (b) rejects the express words of Christ, e.g., John 14:15, (c) emphasizes "grace" meaning "turning grace into license," permission to disobey commandments, Romans 6:1, on the pretext that they are one-time, temporary, voluntary, or "done away," thus (d) promotes social evils and atrocities, (e) all contrary to the principles of Christ, see

  • William Penn, No Cross, No Crown (1682), Chapter 1, ¶ 7 (rejecting the false notion that people "may be children of God while in a state of disobedience to his holy commandments, and disciples of Jesus though they revolt from his cross.")

  • Alex de Jonge, The Life and Times of Grigorii Rasputin (New York: Coward, McCann & Geoghegan, 1982) (Rasputin was a typical "grace Christian" of the Romans 6:1 type, with resultant orgies, debaucheries, drunkenness, licentiousness, as a natural and probable consequence, thus warranting the Romans 6:21 / Zechariah 13:2-6 outcome)

  • William E. McKibben, "The Christian Paradox"   (Harpers, August 2005) ("Only 40 percent of Americans can name more than four of the Ten Commandments, and a scant half can cite any of the four authors of the Gospels. Twelve percent believe Joan of Arc was Noah's wife.")

  • Rev. Lorenzo Dow, Public Works, p 83 ("What dangerous sentiments these ["grace" notions] are, not only on a religious point of view, to lull people to sleep, but also in civil and political respect; for if one falls into public scandal [sin], and retaining an idea of being secured unchangeably in the favor of God, he cannot be under the principles of honor, nor yet the idea of future rewards and punishments; and of course hath nothing to restrain him, wherefore he is a dangerous citizen and subject. This is the truth and it cannot be confuted.")

  • Upton Sinclair, The Profits of Religion: An Essay in Economic Interpretation (1917) (depicts and “attacks institutionalized religion as a 'source of income to parasites, and the natural ally of every form of oppression and exploitation'” and cites deterioration of enforcement of the Bible commandments against usury: “Throughout ancient Hebrew history the money-lender was an outcast; both the law and the prophets denounced him without mercy, and it was made perfectly clear that what was meant was, not the taking of high interest, but the taking of any interest whatsoever. The early church fathers were explicit, and the Catholic Church for a thousand years consigned money-lenders unhesitatingly to hell.” In contrast, the modern commandment-repealing, grace-emphasizing Church is “a kind of amiable fake . . . spreading the pestilence.”)

  • Sinclair Lewis, Elmer Gantry (1927), noting that “the church is in bondage to Big Business and doctrines as laid down by millionaires”   (Chapter XXVII, last paragraph, p 364), with the goal “that workmen would turn from agitation to higher things, and work more loyally at the same wages” (Chapter XIII, Section III, p 195). Such churches reject Christ's command, "Every one of you who does not renounce all he has cannot be my disciple" (Luke 14:33), and refuse to follow His directions to the church, "to teach [the members] to observe all things whatsover that I commanded you," Matthew 28:20. [See background.]

  • Pretended Chistianity, atheism in practice, with its emphasis on "grace," is carefully designed as a fraud: “. . . you don't have to be pious with us. Ma and I are a couple of old dragoons. We like religion; like the good old hymns—takes us back to the hick town we came from; and we believe religion is a fine thing to keep people in order—they think of higher things instead of all these strikes and big wages and the kind of hell-raising that's throwing the industrial system all out of kilter. And I like a fine upstanding preacher that can give a good show. . . . But we ain't pious [pursuant to "grace"]. And any time you want to let down—and I reckon there must be times when a big cuss like you must get pretty sick of listening to the snivelling sisterhood!—you just come to us, and if you want to smoke or even throw in a little jolt of liquor, as I've been known to do, why we'll understand.” Chapter XXIII, Section II, paragraph 12, p 302.

  • Such clergymen may enter or “stay in it [the ministry] . . . to destroy it [the church]!” Chapter VIII, Section II, p 122.

  • And: “Lot easier [being a preacher] than [a lawyer] digging out law-cases [researching precedents] and having to put it over [explain factually to] a jury and another lawyer maybe smarter'n you are. The crowd have to swallow what you [a preacher] tell 'em in a pulpit, and no back-talk or cross-examination allowed! . . . he [the clergyman] snickered.” Chapter III, Section III, p 51.

  • And: “no one in this room, including your pastor, believes in the Christian religion. Not one of us would turn the other cheek [Matthew 5:29, Luke 6:29].   Not one of us would sell all that he has and give to the poor [Matthew 19:21, Luke 18:22, Mark 10:21].   Not one of us would give his coat to some man who took his overcoat. [Matthew 5:40, Luke 3:11].   Every one of us lays up all the treasure he can [Matthew 6:19-21].   We don't practice the Christian religion. We don't intend to practice it. Therefore, we don't believe in it. Therefore I resign, and I advise you to quit lying and disband [the congregation].” Chapter XXIX, Section VII, paragraph 4, p 385. And see James Benedict Moore, M.A., "The Sources of Elmer Gantry," The New Republic 143 (8 August 1960).
    Unfortunately, such data goes over the heads of most U.S. “Christians.” “American religion may be the most unreflective in the world. It is unreflective almost as a matter of principle.”—Leon Wieseltier, in “Washington Diary: Opiates,” The New Republic, Vol. 238, Issue # 4835 (7 May 2008), p 56.
    The “reformer” Martin Luther typifies this type immorality. He was for “grace,” therefore he hated the Bible Society Management Laws, so it followed in his mind that when peasants asked that the Bible Laws be obeyed and enforced, he favored killing the peasants! See “Against the Robbing and Murdering Hordes of Peasants” (May 1525), “Martin Luther,” and Upton Sinclair, Profits of Religion (1917), § on “Face of Caesar.” Luther thereby succeeded in (a) abolishing the Commandments and (b) substituting so-called "grace" (permission to disobey God's Commandments, Romans 6:1-2, 12-16, Romans 7:7, 12, 22)
    By so doing, Luther thereby violated his own two precepts:
  • "The church that preaches the gospel in all of its fullness, except as it applies to the great social ills of the day, is failing to preach the gospel."
  • "War is the greatest plague that can afflict humanity; it destroys religions, it destroys states, it destroys families. Any scourge is preferable to it."
    Pres. John Quincy Adams“The law given from Sinai was a civil and municipal as well as a moral and religious code; it contained many statutes . . . of universal application—laws essential to the existence of men in society,” said U.S. President John Quincy Adams, Letters of John Quincy Adams, to His Son, on the Bible and Its Teachings (Auburn: James M. Alden, 1850), p. 61.
    “We might rest [base] the demonstration [proof] of a divine inspiration of the Pentateuch [Bible Society Management Laws] in no small degree on the supernatural benevolence and wisdom of those laws,” says a rare honest clergyman, Rev. George B. Cheever, D.D., God Against Slavery (Cincinnati: Am. Reform Tract and Book Society, 1857), p 151.   "The Mosaic code being essentially moral . . . naturally produced a social Utopia," p 106.   These Utopian laws institutionalize, flesh out, detail, the two primary commands, 'love God' and 'love thy neighbor.' Matthew 22:40. They are not to be added to nor subtracted from, say Deuteronomy 4:2 and 12:32 (Commandments 14-15),   Joshua 1:7, and Revelation 22:18.   For background on the sin of adding / subtracting, see, e.g., Numbers 16:1-40 (Korah's Rebellion); 1 Samuel 10:8, 1 Samuel 13:8-14, 1 Samuel 15:1-29 (Saul's Rebellion); 2 Chronicles 26:16-21 (Uzziah's Rebellion); and 1 Corinthians 6:10 (extortion). See also Judges 17:6 and 21:25 and 1 Samuel 8:7.
    And note these laws' continuing validity in the New Testament era, in the fugitive-servant example, pp 23-24, Speech (30 Oct 1856), by Rev. Cheever. And see his Pulpit (June 1856), pp 10-11. Of course these laws continue in effect, e.g., the sewer system command; the pertinent divine purpose (e.g., health and prosperity, 3 John 2) continues!
    In contrast, the vile emperor-worship type of pretended Christians, took the extreme opposite view. Note, for example, laws against "vagabonds." "Sixteenth-century [English] vagabonds were basically basically destitute, homeless wanderers. We would probably call them the hard-core unemployed . . . vagabondage was actually made a crime." This was occurring because "many landlords were evicting tenant farmers from lands their families had occupied for centuries," say Phyllis Elperin Clark, M.A., and Robert Lehrman, M.F.A., Doing Time: A Look at Crime and Prisons (New York: Hastings House, 1980), pp 28-29. And "more than seven million acres of the common land were stolen from the people," says Upton Sinclair, Profits of Religion (1917), § on "Land and Livings."
  • Did the so-called Christian clergy oppose the politician disregard of the Bible Society Management Laws, and urge a Jubilee and land ownership for all? the abolition of poverty pursuant to Bible precedent?
  • No, of course not! "Christian" emperor-worshippers in reality gave out the notion "that poverty was basically the result of immorality and so not much different from thieving," p 29. Note NO mention of the Bible Society Management Laws on land ownership for all!
  • Due to the massive clergy-abetted violation of the Bible Society Management Laws, "England was going through a period of geat economic changes," p 29, leading to much poverty. The politician "solution" was NOT obeying Bible precedent, but . . . jails, beatings, burnings, under so-called "Poor Laws" for the victims of the violations! and not one word of reproof from the pretended Christian clergy, rather, support for the politician-passed punitive laws!
  • Exception: For a very short time, during the Puritan era, 1640's - 1650's, a group called the "Levelers" advocated moving in the Bible Society Management Laws direction on this subject, but mainstream Puritans and the other churches vehemently denounced them; and they were put down. See example by Richard Hildreth, Atrocious Judges (New York and Auburn: Orton & Mulligan, 1856), p 33.
  • "Levelers" evidently realized that Bible Society Management Laws are the method, the way, by which continuing divine intentions for people (e.g., prosperity, health, 3 John 2) are institutionalized and achieved. These intentions are not to be limited, undermined, subordinated (as false "Christians" were doing, and still do) to politicians' whimsies.
    Modern "Poor Laws" are called "welfare" laws. Such laws are typically immoral, abusive, extortionate, and degrading. None of them abolish the causes of poverty, as abolishing causes would mean enforcing the Bible Society Management Laws. Immoral, depraved politicians would much rather denounce and revile the poor, than obey those laws. Such politicians are like Ancient Sodom (Ezekiel 16:49, 50 ).
    The corrupt intent and purposes of pretending that the Bible Society Management Laws have been "done away," can be seen by the fruits of that heresy. "You shall know them by their fruits," Matthew 7:16, 20. The fruits include the "divine right" notion, pp 50-51; the corrupt triple alliance of Army, Church and Nobility, p 10; and the ease of starting wars, p 405, in Edward Crankshaw, The Fall of the House of Habsburg (New York: Viking Press, 1963). The corrupt Army, Church, Nobility alliance, disportionately injures—"injury" being the "fruits"—the middle class and the poor, thus pointing to, showing, verifying the wicked intent of those who pretend the Bible Society Management Laws are "done away."
    The Bible Laws' continuing applicability is needed as the "law of love" by itself says only to "love," does not specify and define, in cases of conflict of whom to love (e.g., creditor-borrower, master-servant, etc.) which has priority. Only by the continuing applicability of the Bible Society Management Laws can we know that. Politician laws have a record of error, preferring creditors and setting up debtors' prisons, preferring masters vs. fugitive servants, supporting slavery, causing wars even world wars, etc.
    In 'Emperor-worship' masquerading as "Christianity" (2 Corinthians 11:13-15), politician-laws issued by demonized politicans (Luke 4:5-6, Matthew 4:8, etc.) are used instead of Bible laws! Priorities and benefits of the Bible's agrarian-system of laws (detailed by, e.g., Rev. Theodore Weld) are ignored, rejected, spurned, ridiculed, pretended not to exist. Modern so-called "Christian" clergyman have the same hostility to the Bible laws as did Ancient Israel, as recorded in their many rebellions against the Bible system, in Judges, 1 Samuel 8, 2 Kings, 2 Chronicles, Jeremiah, Isaiah, etc. See 1 Kings 18:19, an 850:1 ratio of lying vs honest clergy.
    All the above-listed Bible laws, civil-society-running laws, are ignored, declared 'done away' by so-called "liberty in Christ' (aka 'grace'), voided, slandered, repealed, and defied, by the pretended 'Christians.' The view that such laws have continuing validity is put down and ridiculed as "legalism." The purpose, intent, of such denunciation is to do whatever they please, free to sin unlimited. By their fruit, ye shall know them.
    Note this example, an immoral “Christian” clergyman who “preached a gushing gospel of loving words but . . . contained little practical advice.”—Barbara Goldsmith, Other Powers (NY: Alfred A. Knopf, 1998), p 113. Saying likewise is Upton Sinclair, Profits of Religion (1917), § 2.15, Horn Blowing.
    See also Romans 1:28-32, describing that mental state and behavior pattern of not wanting to retain God and his ways, thereby leading to multiple moral and social evils, pursuant to their doing away with the Bible Society Management Laws. Such types may profess the God of nature (the natural creation and selected traits thereof, e.g., natural beauty, wonders, phenomena, regeneration, regrowth, etc.) while simultaneously silent on, dismissive of, hostile to, doing away with, His laws. Such types especially reject any God commanding them in their relationships with fellow human beings. They preach a "different gospel," Galatians 1:6-9, one without commandments directing their behavior, including their economic and social behavior—rules they especially hate and wish to defy.
    Such "Christians" fall into the category shown in Matthew 7:21 and Luke 19:14, 27, claiming to call on God, but in reality hating him, so to be done away with.
    For more exposing of pretended Christianity, see the Appendix, pp 118-125, in the book Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass (Boston: Anti-Slavery Offfice, 28 April 1845).
    Fake “Christians” have this trait: “seemed mostly interested in saving their own souls and in getting [themselves] to heaven. They seldom talked [cared] about helping their fellow man.”—Aletha Jane Lindstrom, Sojourner Truth (New York: Julian Messner, 1980), p 73. Such disregard violates James 2:14-17 (duty of doing good works).
    African blacks found that when oppressed by the Portuguese: "Catholicism supported the Portuguese [oppressors]. American Protestant missionaries were at odds with the Portuguese, but in the end taught passive submission," says John Stockwell, In Search of Enemies: A CIA Story (New York: W.W. Norton & Co, Inc., 1978), p 65. None favored following the Bible's James 2:16 guidance to take pro-active action, i.e., to do more than offer words (if that much). "Passive submission" is a demonized notion designed to obstruct pro-active good works.
    Fake “Christians” denounce the James 2:14-17 concept of doing practical good deeds, "works," insisting they are "under grace." Such claims that any "works" / 'good deeds" command (to do the practical to help fellow man, as the Bible Society Management Laws, supra, are) is "legalism," which they "under grace" are "freed" from! A classic example of such denunciation is by Martin Luther who ridiculed James as a “book of straw” due to its advocacy of taking practical actions. His approach was to oppose doing good works, in fact, Martin Luther actively aided the German nobility in commmitting oppressions and killings of peasants in reprisal against the peasants supporting God's Laws and wanting them enforced.
    “To include all that is designated as atheism, it is necessary to distinguish between theoretical atheism and practical atheism. Theoretical atheism, is the denial, in principle, that there is a god. . . . Practical atheism, on the contrary, is not limited to the intelligentsia, but represents the working [life-style] philosophy of large numbers of men [people]. Practical atheism is the denial, in practice [life-style], that there is a god [with laws]. For such a philosophy, the question of the existence of God [His laws] is irrelevant to the meaning of life and the decisions of human existence,” says “Atheism," Encyclopedia Britannica, Vol. 2 (1963), p 667. Fake “Christians,” i.e., the vast majority, are “practical atheists,” denying relevance of God's laws in human existence, everyday life-style. Their pretext excuse is those laws are “irrelevant,” “done-away,” using them would be a "theocracy," and they want everyone under politician laws, which they call "civil laws." See 2 Corinthians 11:13-15 for background on such "Christian" clergy, and an example from the book Elmer Gantry.
    Said another way: "The greatest source of atheism in the world today is Christians, who acknowledge Jesus with their lips but deny Him by their lifestyles. That is what an unbelieving world simply finds unbelievable." Fake “Christians” can always find some excuse for their self-centered priority (getting themselves to heaven). Any “having” to “do good” is “salvation by works,” “legalism,” or some/any other pejorative term they can devise. They serve man only, themselves, and their personal doctrines and pet peeves.
    Real Christians believe you cannot serve both God and mammon, Matt. 6:24; Luke 16:13; Acts 5:29, including politicians, and their "traditions of men." Matt. 15:3, 6, 9; Mark 7:7-9, 13; Colossians 2:8.
    The fakes insist that ALL God's laws are 'done away,' by so-called 'liberty in Christ,' aka 'grace.' The fakes limit God to being allowed to have ONLY those minimal few laws that the fakes say are the bare minimum necessary for salvation, the bare minimum needed to just barely slip by into heaven!
    The fakes limit God, insisting that he cannot have any purpose but eternal salvation in mind, cannot have, for example, health, financial, or society-management principles in mind for this life.
    The "do-the-bare-minimum" attitude is repeatedly condemned in the Bible, e.g., in Matthew 25:30, Luke 17:10, Romans 3:12. This occurred as "evil men and seducers shall wax worse and worse" after the First Century A.D., 2 Tim. 3:13. Thus the full range of Bible truths are rarely taught, constituting the prophesied famine famine of preaching God's Word, Amos 8:11. This it is necessary for the rare learners of the truth, to "strive" for it and the results thereof, Luke 13:24.
    As part of this prophesied "famine," fake "Christians" proclaim "liberty in Christ" to reject God's society-management laws. Jeremiah 34:14 shows God's rebuttal; such evil people eventually bring down onto their nation, "liberty" for wars, famines, diseases, mass migrations, deportations, exile.
    Now do you believe that the fakes are 'emperor-worshippers?'—'politician-worshippers'?
    The fakes do away with the Bible laws, refuse to support them, but vigorously support replacement laws, politician-devised laws, instead! covering the same subject, and contradicting the Bible laws! (See, e.g., Rev. Charles Baldwin,"Have Christians Already Accepted The Mark Of The Beast?" (14 August 2007).)
    The fakes do this despite the obvious fact that civil laws (dealing with such basic economic, societal, family, and misbehavior issues) are necessary for running society until Messiah comes. The fake 'Christians' annul, void God's laws for running society, say they're "done away."
    Fake 'Christians' would have you believe that God is so stupid, unloving, and self-contradictory, as to repeal all His laws for running civil society until Messiah comes! The fake 'Christians' deny that God wants people to have prosperity and health (3 John 2) by their declaring 'done away' all God's laws that have accomplishing those goals as their function, fruit, effect, consequence.
    The fake 'Christians' limit God, preclude him for having ANY laws except those unprofitable few, bare minimum few, supposedly the scantiest few needed to barely attain salvation, heaven. The fakes limit God to having ONLY that one purpose in his laws. They forbid God to have additional purposes such as civil and criminal law society-running purposes, e.g., to help people be prosperous, healthy, and safe in THIS life. The fakes abolish all God's laws that they say have this disallowed-by-them purpose. They limit God, forbid Him to have ANY purpose in his laws except one goal, personal salvation, getting oneself individually to heaven.
    Of course, the fake 'Christians' do not set this same limitation on politicians. To the fake Christians, politicians are allowed to have ANY goal, ANY purpose, in THEIR laws, even the most bizarre and outlandish!
    The fake 'Christians' limiting God so savagely, while setting no limits on politician purposes, confirms that the fakes' real goal is 'emperor-worship,' politician-worship. The fakes know that people NEED laws in this life, for running society until Messiah comes. Due to their hatred of God, the fakes rescind all His society-running laws, for the purpose of forcing people to look to politicians
  • to save them in this life,
  • to give them the prosperity and health that the fakes limit and forbid God to have any laws to effectuate, accomplish, produce.
    This massive annulment of God's society-running laws by fake 'Christians' in turn leads to massive social ills, e.g., poverty, homelessness, unemployment, crime, drug abuse, diseases, high interest rates, bankruptcies, high taxes, discrimination, high insurance costs, massive prison-business, campaign contributions corrupting law-makers, economic dislocations, depressions, recessions, etc. Once God's laws to create prosperity and health are 'done away,' naturally their opposites occur in consequence. "By their fruits you know them." (Matthew 7:16 and 20).
    Indeed, the doing away with God's society-management laws leads to all the many conditions and evils they were written to prevent. For a Bible-law list, see the Bible civil law system list. Pretended Christian clergy never open their mouths on these matters! Except to denounce them, such clergy [heathens in reality] claim the society-management laws of God are 'done away' in the name of 'liberty in Christ.' The fakes are of course for 'liberty in politicians,' of course! as true 'emperor-worshippers,' 'politician-worshippers.' (In churches of politician worshippers, they display their nation's flag; look for it.)
    A dramatic example of bad consequences from the Rasputinists, "grace" types, doing away with Bible society-management law, relates to the Deuteronomy 23:12-14 command (Commandments 609-610 of 613) to have a sewer system, i.e., to bury, cover, human waste. The fake Christian church in the post-Diocletian Dark Ages, announced during the Middle Ages, that this Bible command is 'done away,' in the name of so-called 'liberty in Christ.' Grace will cover it, Christ will cover it, no need for you to cover it, no need for you to bury it, no need for people to have a sewer system to bury human waste. Throw human excrement in the street, that's ok, said the Middle Ages "Christian" Raputinist "grace" church; Christ'll cover it. 'Liberty in Christ' means you can disobey God's pro-health sanitation law. The fakes limited God, said God is NOT allowed to have any purpose in his laws except the bare minimum for 'saving' you for heaven. And a sanitation sewage law for physical health in/during this life, definitely is not that kind of law! God is not allowed to have people follow such a law any more, say they. So for "Christian liberty" sake, do NOT flush your toilet!! Don't be a slave to that "old law," that's "done away." You can throw the excrement in the street! [Yeah, right!!] And of course, when diseases result from your defiance of the pro-active health commandments, blame God for "allowing" those diseases! Pray for cures! for healing! [but NEVER for prevention!!]
    The "natural and probable consequences" result of this rebellious attitude, this anti-Bible-law teaching, this anti-sanitation doctrine, this anti-hygiene doctrine, came about: the Black Death, with millions of casualties.
    Such casualties were primarily among Christians. Apparently Christ ('liberty in Christ,' 'grace') didn't cover it [human waste]!
    Casualties were rarer among Jews keeping the Bible hygienic and sanitation commandments (# 609 - # 610), Deuteronomy 23:12-14. The fake 'Christians' were enraged; the sanitation law has the wrong purpose according to them; God, say the fakes, is forbidden to have any purpose in his laws except 'saving' you for heaven.
    Jews obeying God's sanitation law had fewer casualties. Did "Christians" get the point? Did the fake Christians learn from this? Did they repent of their rebellion against Bible society-management law? Did they repent of their denial of it even existing as valid law? Did they repent, dig holes as commanded?
    No, they blamed the hygienic Jews obeying (as still in effect) the Bible's sewer system command to bury human waste! And the murderous fake Christians persecuted and killed them (the Bible-law-obeying Jews)!
    The killings of Jews began by “charges originating in Savoy” blaming Jews, and had the support of Emperor Charles IV. The result was that "60 large and 150 small communities were exterminated. . . . This was the greatest disaster which occurred to German Jewry in the Middle Ages."—Cecil Roth, B. Litt., M.A., D. Phil. and Geoffrey Wigoder, D. Phil., The New Standard Jewish Encyclopedia (Jerusalem: Masada Press, 1959-1975), p 319. (Only the later Hitler Holocaust would be worse.)
    "Chistians" including televangelists will say lots of words over you to "pray for you" and do a "miracle healing" after you are sick. But they refuse to say a word in advance on the "how" of prevention. Their focus is solely 'after-the-fact,' no pro-active preventionism allowed. Their excuse for their "after-the-fact" approach is that citing Bible Society Management Laws' preventionism principles would be "legalism"! "Legalism" is to be avoided no matter how many must die! (Of course, politician "legalism" in terms of passing tens of thousands of laws is OK!)
    Consequences of rebelling against the Bible system in this regard continue. See "The Crumbling of America" (2007), on-point.
    Note the still valid example of the ban on returning fugitive servants, given in Moses' era, p 20, and still valid centuries later, pp 23-24, of Speech (1856), by Rev. George B. Cheever, D.D.
    Consider also the Bible's building code type laws designed to prevent injuries. One law prevents poorly designed roofs which could result in people falling off (Deuteronomy 22:8, Commandments 263-264). That law requires a fence. Note also laws to protect the handicapped, the laws against cursing the deaf and putting a stumbling block before the blind. (Leviticus 19:14, Commandment 34). These laws ban hazards that can linger and cause harm indiscriminately, re which the modern legal term is "universal malice."
    See also the "Old Testament" law (actually a Society Management Law), about having two or three witnesses to establish a matter, in Numbers 35:30, Deuteronomy 17:6, and 19:15 (Commandments 242 and 247). The Apostle Paul treated this as still in effect, in 2 Corinthians 13:11 Timothy 5:19, and Hebrews 10:28, i.e., as still valid centuries later, and continuing in the "New Testament" era. (Paul said he followed all Bible Laws, in Acts 22:3 and 23:1, and that those Laws were still in effect, Romans 3:31, an analysis supported by John in I John 3:24 and 5:3). The two-three witnesses law is only one of several such laws treated in the New Testament as still in effect.
    Note also the command to all people to repent, Acts 17:30, etc. The duty to repent connotes rules, rules being disobeyed, and re which one must stop disobeying, repent. All are to be of one mind, all supporting God's Truth, none deviating. 1 Corinthians 1:10. Warning against not doing so is cited in, e.g., Deuteronomy 13, Matthew 7:21, and Romans 6:1-2 and 23.
    Note Matthew 5:17-18, Christ's general affirmation of the Bible Society Management Laws. See also specifics, e.g.,
  • Acts 15:20 upholding laws against eating blood (Leviticus 7:26, Commandment 167) and strangled animals (Deuteronomy 14:21, Commandment 156)
  • Acts 15:21 citing attending synagogue on the Sabbath so as to learn the 613 commandments (they already knew the Ten)
  • Matthew 22:37-40 upholding continued applicability of Leviticus 19:18 (Commandment 26) and Deuteronomy 6:5 (Commandment 7).
    And see this example, based on the Exodus 11:7 and Deuteronomy 14:8 commands (and Isaiah 65:4, 66:3 and 66:17) on what not to eat, e.g., the command against pork. Fake "Christians" insist that God is limited, is limited to only one purpose for His laws, is not allowed to have a health purpose for his laws. Note an example of just one effect of this killer teaching: mass death among North American Indians, from new diseases including due to pork brought to them by the "Christian" conquistadores (fancy term for Columbus-era genocidal murderers). Note the article by Charles C. Mann, “1491,” 289 Atlantic Monthly (#3) 41-53, at 46 (March 2002). America at Columbus' time had had 150,000,000 natives, "cent cinquante millions d'hommes,"—Dr. Hippolyte A. Depierris, Physiologie Sociale (Paris: Dentu, 1876), p 25. After "Christians" arrived, ALL the Indians were killed, except about a million.
    One way to detect false Christians is to note their use of the term "Ten Commandments," as though ten were all the commandments there were! Their purpose of using that term ("Ten Commandments") is fraud, to divert attention off the many other commandments. (The "Ten Commandments" are only the preface or preamble to the full listing of commandments! 613 in total! Referring to only the introductory Ten, is like referring to only the Preamble of the U.S. Constitution, omitting to mention the many additional clauses! and then denying their existence or validity!)
    Once fake “Christians” said God's law of love, his Society Management Laws, were “done away,” these “Christians” brought on the world, holocaust after holocaust, repeated genocidal blood-lusts of mass slaughters, and world wars. The carnal mind is enmity against God. (Romans 8:7; James 4:4).
    One of the U.S. Founding Fathers had warned: “Religious bondage shackles and debilitates the mind and unfits it for every noble enterprise, every expanded project.”— James Madison (1 April 1774).
    Fake "Christians" are enemies of God, of God's society-management laws of love; instead they are friends of this world and its carnal laws, written by desperately wicked, depraved, psychopathic, politicians, politicians being the "basest of men," meaning the scum of the earth. The scum rises to the top. (Jeremiah 17:9; Daniel 4:17; compare with e.g., Luke 4:5-6, Matthew 4:8). Their morals are a joke. And so-called "Christians" support them and their laws, against God's, every day. God's society-management laws, most "Christians" (being fakes) hate them!
    If you deny that the fake 'Christians' have a hatred of God's Bible-society-management-laws, test the matter for yourself. Ask any 'Christian' to explain
  • the Bible society-management law system, and
  • its non-salvation purposes (above-listed).

  • You'll invariably with the fakes, get a blank look! then a denial of the benefits! denial that the Bible system was anything but a curse, 'bondage,' and slavery! The fakes limit God, forbid him to have ANY purpose in his laws except saving you for heaven! If you cite any other purpose in God's laws (e.g., for prosperity or health in this life), they scream and tirade 'bondage' or 'curse'!! On the other hand, such fakes (in reality, emperor-worshippers, politician-worshippers), support carnal politicians in having such professed purposes in THEIR laws!!
    Only a real Christian, few and far between, a “little flock” [Luke 12:32] will be able to tell you the above-cited benefit data.
    In other words, due to Roman persecutions pre- and during the Diocletian era, and doctrine deterioration thereafter, there has been a massive reduction in acknowledgment of the existence and validity of God's society-management laws. A similar law-deterioration process had occurred in Ancient Rome generally, says Edward Rogers, Slavery Illegality (1855), pp. 15-23; see also Rogers' papacy section, pp 42-50.
    In slavery context, "Christian" idolaters, politician-worshippers in essence, instead of going by Bible laws, went (and go) by politician views. The fake Christians went (and go) by politician views even when those politicians were drunkards, whoremongers, gamblers. The fake Christians even ignored, denied, opposed, the actual text of the Constitution, making slavery unconstitutional.
    The fake 'Christians' refused to acknowledge the anti-slavery and other pertinent Bible laws and principles, not even the one against extortion! For background, see Rev. John Fee's 1851 Anti-Slavery Manual (1851), and, e.g., the anti-extortion data, p 10, and the Ed. Note at p 62.
    "[N]othing . . . has done so much to tolerate and perpetuate the sin in our midst, as the practice [tradition] of the Church."—Rev. Fee, Anti-Slavery Manual, p 69.
    And, "verily, three fourths of all the Episcopalians, Methodists, Baptists, and Presbyterians, in eleven states of the Union, are of the devil."—Rev. James Smylie, quoted by Rev. Stephen Foster, Brotherhood of Thieves (1843), pp 14-15.
    Such immoral "Christians" in the name of "liberty in Christ" supported rampant family destruction in slavery, selling husbands and wives away from each other, then piously mouthing "repeated remarriages are ok for them". See James Birney, Bulwarks (1840), pp 26-27.
    Examples of 'emperor worship' are still evident, e.g.,
  • (1) remarks by clergy about Christians being supposed to do nothing to solve current problems but rather 'wait for God's time' (the immoral clergy attitude James condemned in all people in James 2:14-20; Christ condemned in all people in Matthew 25:41-46; and, re the clergy in particular, in the Parable of the Good Samaritan, Luke 10:30-35, as per Ezekiel 22:29-31);

  • (2) remarks on how religious some politician supposedly is, typically citing some pro-tobacco politician aiding and abetting the killing of tens of millions!

  • (3) remarks ignoring Daniel 4:16-17 saying that leaders are typically the basest of men, the scum of society, individuals without understanding;

  • (4) remarks ignoring Daniel 2:32 and 38 data on Nebuchadnezzar as THE "head of gold," THE best of all government officials, superior to ALL who would follow, though HE was an arrogant, "know-it-all," insane, animal-level, fool without "understanding" (Daniel 4:32-33), but still he [as "head of gold"] was superior to the politicians who would follow;

  • (5) remarks ignoring Luke 4:5-6, Matthew 4:8, on Satan's role in politican governent;

  • (6) 'American civil religion,' in essence, replacing Christian doctrine with sucking up to politicians, typically of the 'right,' people causing the very problems they profess to oppose.

    So "justification by faith meant faith in a political system. . . ."—Constance McL. Green, Eli Whitney and the Birth of American Technology (Boston: Little, Brown & Co, 1956), p 191.

  • (7) Note Charles Sumner's example in On War (Boston: 1849), p 238, of people being patriots (e.g., Venetians) first, Christians second. [Not to single out Venetians, this applies almost unanimously! in all nations. See The True Grandeur of Nations (Boston: 1845), p 45, overview.]

  • (8) Note Count Leo Tolstóy's reference to "Christian" nations' war preparations, in Why Do People Intoxicate Themselves? (10 June 1890), p 22.

  • Contrast Muslim higher morals than Christian examples.
    These are truths you will NOT learn from standard “Christians” (emperor-worshippers) supporting demonized politicians (Luke 4:5-6, Matthew 4:8. A significant trait of poltician government is the use of extortion. Extortion is contrary to 1 Corinthians 6:10. Politician government relies on extortion, via police, prisons, military, and wars. The Bible Society Management Laws rely on love and voluntary consent, and so provided for no police, no jails, and no military.
    So-called “Christians” (in reality, “emperor-worshippers”) have even gone to the extreme of worshipping Adolf Hitler as Christ-like, a genocidal killer! And real Christianity gets the blame, for what this yet another fake, committed.
    No wonder James Madison, one of the U.S. Founding Fathers, had warned: “Religious bondage shackles and debilitates the mind and unfits it for every noble enterprise, every expanded project” (1774). And note Jesse Ventura's analysis, “Organized religion is a sham and a crutch for weak-minded people. . . .” Cf. Paul's similar analysis, 1 Cor. 1:26.
    A parallel religion to political 'civil-religion Christianity' is Japan's Shintoism, reverence of natural forces, emperors, heroes. So-called 'Christians' are in essence Shinto! The fake Christians have 'emperor worship,' in the form of political government worship / reverence, political laws always having validity, Bible society-management-laws-until-Messiah, never deemed valid.
    Fake "Christians" defy the fact that Bible society-management laws are for this-life purposes, here-and-now purposes, such as prosperty and health now, not salvation for heaven, so the fake 'Christians' insist such laws are "done away"! as a 'curse' or 'bondage'!!.
    Rev. Pillsbury was in essence, challenging this evil mindset. He was challenging the entrenched political-Christianity mind-set, the 'American-civil-religion' mind-set, the American emperor-worship “civil religion."
    As shown in that era, so-called 'American Christianity' had become atheist, vile, demonized.
    Even pro-slavery clergy admitted there were few Christians in the South.
  • But my higher, more divine commission became to me from that time more and more sacred and important. Under it, I have spoken the words of truth, righteousness and freedom for more than forty years, to multitudes of men, women and children in both the hemispheres, and as I humbly hope and trust, not all in vain.

    The first open, direct arraignment of the American church and clergy as the guilty accomplices, north and south, in all the crimes and cruelties, the sins and shames of slavery, was a little pamphlet, entitled, "The American Churches the Bulwarks of American Slavery." It was written by an American [James G. Birney], though first

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    published in England in 1840. The last [slavery-era book] of similar import and purpose, was a larger work, published in 1847, entitled, "The Church as it is; The Forlorn Hope of Slavery."

    The peculiarity of both these publications was, that the persons and parties whose character and conduct were to be considered, furnished all the testimony themselves, and the evidence was all direct, with no cross question nor quibble of any description, from the other side, so whatever conclusion might be reached, it would be wholly through their own words and works, as by themselves published to the world.

    Since slavery was abolished, the clergy, as was always predicted they would, have claimed [Ed. Note: meaning, the majority clergy intentionally lied] it as the result of their prayers, preaching and votes. [!!]

    But it was never expected that they or their children would boldly declare through pulpit and press, as well as by lips and lungs, that the abolitionists, even Garrison, did more harm than good; that

  • "the final extinction of slavery was accomplished in pursuance of principles which Garrison abhorred, and by measures which he denounced;"

  • that "he had but a heterogeneous following, charged with all the fanaticism of the times; and confined mostly to eastern Massachusetts and northern New England;"

  • a "motley party; was only captain of a corporal's guard;"

  • "his main principles were, down with the constitution, dissolve the union, denounce the churches and ministers, renounce the orthodox belief in the Bible; a man of headlong force, erratic, short-sighted and narrow, thought not of cleansing, but of crushing the temple of liberty, which would have made slavery perpetual and extinguished forever all hope of an American nation!"
  • A semi-centennial discourse, delivered in Cincinnati, Ohio, in April, 1881, contains most of these quota-

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    tions; and Rev. A. T. Rankin, in some published essays, the present year, supplies part of the remainder.

    But it remained for Leonard Woolsey Bacon, son of the late Dr. Leonard Bacon, of Connecticut, to print such a life-size portrait of Garrison as will be here subjoined. It is in a biographical sketch of his father, in a popular magazine.

    Dr. Bacon's anti-slavery [!!] was worthy such a [lying] son, and to be by him celebrated in the manner it is in the notice furnished the Century. It received many well-deserved scathings when it appeared, and as anti-slavery had nothing to fear from the father, so neither has the memory or good name of Garrison anything to dread from the contemptuous caricatures of the son. Both may be safely trusted to history and to posterity. But here is the Woolsey Bacon portrait:

    In almost any assembly of crotchety people—long-haired men and short-haired women—over a scheme for the reconstruction of the solar system, you will hear the appeal to

    "Remember Garrison, how he began with nothing and a printing-press against the whole nation and the whole church, and how at last he succeeded in bringing everybody over to his side."

    It is really a matter of interest to public morals that the ingenuous youth of America should know the truth of this matter—that

  • Mr. Garrison and his society never succeeded in anything;

  • that his one distinctive dogma, that slave-holding is always and everywhere a sin, was never accepted to any considerable extent outside of the little ring of his personal adherents;

  • that his vocabulary, which had no word but man-stealer and pirate for the legal guardian of a decrepit
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    negro, or for one holding a family of slaves in transit for a free state, with intent to emancipate them, never became part of the American dictionary;

  • that the sophistry with which he spent a lifetime in trying to confuse plain distinctions had little effect except to give acrimony and plausibility to the defense of slavery;

  • and that the final extinction of slavery was accomplished
    • in pursuance of principles which he abhorred,

    • by measures which he denounced,

    • and under the leadership of men like Leonard Bacon, in literature and the church, and Abraham Lincoln in politics, who had been the objects of his incessant and calumnious vituperation.
  • And yet this bold calumniator has the grace to admit that

    "the brunt of my [his] father's arguments in the earlier stages of the slavery controversy, was directed more against the so-called abolitionists than against the advocates of slavery."

    Till the firing on Fort Sumter the abolitionists never knew that "the brunt of Dr. Bacon's arguments was ever changed in its direction," to any important purpose, to either side. Leonard Woolsey Bacon graciously thinks, however, that Garrison, now that slavery is abolished, may "be forgiven the great harm he did for the sake of the little good."

    But all this aside from the main question in hand. The clergy to-day would have the world believe they were always opposed to slavery, and sought its overthrow. They were opposed to slavery just as was the government. No more; no less.

    Ed. Note: Such disinformation pretending that "the religious right" had opposed slavery, continues to present. For example, note the column, "A surprising coalition ended slavery in Britain," by Thomas Sowell, in The Detroit News, Sunday 13 Feb 2005, p 16A. The webmaster immediately forwarded a rebuttal as follows:
    Subject: Letter to Editor: Answering Thomas Sowell Column on Slavery
    Date: Feb 13, 2005 8:38 PM

    Dear Editor:

    This is to rebut Thomas Sowell's Sunday, p 16A, Detroit News, opinion column on slavery. Contrary to vast history, he alleges "that nowhere before the 18th century was there any serious question raised about whether slavery was right or wrong," and that what would today be deemed "the religious right" first "spearheaded" the opposition!! Sowell passes on the historic pro-slavery view point, that until those awful abolitionists came along, nobody seriously objected to slavery!! Sowell's view is blatantly contrary to history. Abolitionists vigorously refuted that heretical and pro-slavery fabrication. Of the numerous abolitionists doing so, let me cite three.

    1. Abolitionist Rev. George B. Cheever, in his sermon series, God Against Slavery and the Freedom and Duty of the Pulpit To Rebuke It, As a Sin against God (Cincinnati: American Reform Tract and Book Society, 1857), https://medicolegal.tripod.com/cheevergvs.htm , traced condemnations of slavery back to the the Law of Moses, the prophet Jeremiah, and Ancient Judah.

    2. Abolitionist Rev. John Fee, in his Bible history and analysis, An Anti-Slavery Manual, or, The Wrongs of American Slavery Exposed By the Light of the Bible and of Facts, with A Remedy for the Evil, 2d ed. (New York: William Harned, 1851), https://medicolegal.tripod.com/feeasm1851.htm , showed slavery condemned back at least to the time of the Biblical Patriarch Joseph, indeed, in principle, to the time of the Garden of Eden.

    3. Edward Coit Rogers, in his history, Letters on Slavery Addressed to the Pro-slavery Men of America, Showing Its Illegality in All Ages and Nations: Its Destructive War Upon Society and Government, Morals and Religion (Boston: Bela Marsh, 1855), https://medicolegal.tripod.com/rogersuos.htm , showed slavery condemnation among Ancient Greece and Rome, the early Christians, Medieval European societies, and so on!!!

    Sowell is wrong again on who got rid of slavery; he has it exactly backwards!! It was "the religious right" that was FOR slavery. It was the extreme opposite of "the religious right" who ended slavery. The "religious right" aka the Bible-Belt South, roundly condemed abolitionists, deemed them heretics, tarred and feathered them, even lynched them!!

    In order to end slavery, Abraham Lincoln had to call on, not "the religious right," but guys like Gen. Joseph Hooker (with his hooker whorish reputation HQ!) and General Ulysses Grant (with his widely alleged alcoholism) to fight the Civil War against "the religious right" Bible-Belt.

    Abraham Lincoln never credited religionists with ending slavery. They were the enemy being fought and shot!!! Lincoln said the real truth: "The logic and moral power of [heretic] Garrison and the Anti-slavery people . . . And the army have done it all," quote cited by Truman Nelson, Documents of Upheaval: Selections from William Lloyd Garrison's THE LIBERATOR, 1831-1865 (NY: Hill and Wang, 1966), p xvii, https://medicolegal.tripod.com/abolitionists.htm .

    Sowell and his reference (Adam Hochschild, Bury the Chains [assuming Sowell accurately cited him]) have the facts ultra blatantly backwards!! Theirs is an error on the order of magnitude of citing Joseph Stalin as being anti-communist!, or Adolf Hitler as being pro-semitic!!

    Sincerely,

    Leroy J. Pletten

    And if the church and government were against slavery, why did they not put it out of existence? How could it have stood against them?

    If they were opposed to slavery, why

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    were Louisiana and Florida bought for its extension? Why was Mexico robbed of Texas after a four years' bloody and cruel, and fearfully unjust war on our part, only to reinstate slavery where Roman Catholicism a few years before had abolished it, as it hoped, forever?

    Ed. Note: See also the analysis by Sen. Thomas Corwin, "Unjust National Acquistions" (Washington: 11 Feb 1847), and Pillsbury's own analysis, in his 1847 Forlorn Church book, pp. 58-68.

    Whatever of slave-breeding, or slave-holding, or slave-trading abroad, or slave-hunting at home the government authorized and supported, the church sanctioned and sanctified. So also of slavery extension. The clergy actually clamored for chaplaincies in the atrocious Mexican war [8 May 1846-30 May 1848], knowing well its origin and objects. The religious press, north and south, shouted for the war, irrespective of denominational differences. The Presbyterian Herald asked its readers," Do you pray for the Mexicans?" and answered:

    "There are good reasons why you should. They have souls like other men. Is not this overlooked? They are not wild beasts, though like them. Why pray for a Hindoo or a Hottentot? Because he has a soul of infinite value, but exposed to eternal death. So has every Mexican. Because they are all Papists. And will you pray for the conversion of Romanism around you, and not for the conversion of that one thousand miles off?"

    The pope decreed the abolition of slavery in Mexico in 1829, "for the glory of God and to distinguish mankind from the brute creation." Good reason why slave-holding Presbyterians should "pray for the conversion of Mexicans as well as for Hindoos and Hottentots." But the Presbyterian Herald had another reason for praying for the Mexicans, verily this:

    "They are our enemies. This is one of the strongest reasons. Does not the Savior so teach? Matthew v: 44. This does not refer to private enemies only—it extends to public foes also. It may be your duty to fight them, to preserve the life and the liberty of

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    our countrymen—strictly in the defensive. But does that duty to our country exempt us from the other duty to them? Fighting and praying can go together. Jesus was a lion, yet a lamb—so his disciples.

    The Protestant Telegraph viewed the war and its results, thus hopefully:

    I have no fellowship with war, and deeply regret our present relations [war of U.S. aggression to expand slavery] with our sister republic, Mexico; yet I cannot but [self-deludedly] hope for some good from the conflict, and that good is, the entrance of the Protestant religion into the Mexican states.

    The Roman Catholic religion is now the religion of that nation; none other is tolerated; but it is utterly impossible that republican institutions can exist and flourish in connection with Romanism.

    The immense wealth of the churches in Mexico, now hoarded up in idolatrous images of silver and gold, (a petticoat of the Virgin Mary, estimated at half a million,) may [the writer pretends] be distributed among the people as a consequence of this conflict, or be laid out in the establishment of schools, in internal improvements, in efforts of various kinds, to exalt the people.

    "Great is the Diana of the Ephesians [Acts 19:28]," is now the cry, but it may soon give place to "Great is the Lord our God."

    But what shall be said of this from so eminent a Divine, as Rev. Joel Parker, D.D., in a sermon preached, and then published in the Christian Observer?

    I was not an advocate for the present administration [James K. Polk, 1845-1849].

    I cast my vote for the opposing candidates, and my judgment is, that if they had been elected, the Mexican war would have been avoided, and the honor of the country as well preserved as at present.

    But our present chief magistrate [Polk] was duly elected. He is not the president of the democratie party; he is the president of the nation; he is my president and your president, and we are bound to treat him with the same deferential respect as if he had been the very man of our choice.

    Moreover, are we absolutely certain that he is not really laying a foundation for a

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    claim on our gratitude in this very matter of the Mexican war?

    For one, I am free to confess that I am not so well informed in respect to our relations with Mexico, as to be sure that our executive could have wisely avoided this collision.

    Ed. Note: Honest officials were showing that Polk had started the aggression and the war! And the expand-slavery goal.

    Perhaps I am as well acquainted with the subject as the majority of my hearers, yet I have no doubt that a bare three months devoted to an investigation of our past and present relations with Mexico, would secure to me tenfold the amount of intelligence which I at present possess in relation to the subject; and if it were left for me to decide, whether that [aggressive] course of policy should be pursued which has involved us in war, I should not, with my present limited knowledge [and emperor-worship attitude], dare to assume the responsibility of deciding against it!

    Or this in the New England Puritan, from its editor, Rev. Parsons Cooke, D.D.

    The fact that this nation is earnestly engaged in war [of aggression] with a neighboring nation [anti-slavery Mexico], seems to be little realized by the mass of the people, and especially by Christian people, who ought to take a deep interest in the subject.

    But what shall christians do in the case?

    The war [says this fatalist preaching fatalism, do-nothingism] will not be brought to a close the sooner by bringing Christian influence into antagonism with any legal measures for prosecuting the war.

    We are in the war by the [aggressive] acts of our government, and shall get out of it, if we ever do, by the acts of the government and none the sooner for any attempts to embarrass that [slavery-expanding] action.

    Our rulers have taken the responsibility of this plunge, and we, in the exercise of a religious influence, are not called upon either to justify or resist their action.

    As citizens exercising the political franchise, at the proper time, we with the rest, must make our opinions felt, touching such important measures.

    But now the simple question is, what can we do as christians, to secure the favor of Providence and avert the storm?

    The [emperor-worshipper] Rev. Evan Stevenson, editor of a monthly magazine in Georgetown, Kentucky, hungered after the righteousness of such a war [of aggression] as keenly as this discloses:

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    While the war continues, we cannot and will not discuss the question of slavery, as we honestly feel more like discussing roast beef and yams, or, if our service is required, national rights, with our sword on the Rio Grande.

    "We entreat our correspondents that they forward to us for publication no religious controversies pending this conflict with Mexico.

    "Let us drop our denominational prejudices, "Fight the good fight of faith, and lay hold upon eternal life."

    Only two more of these excerpts, and one of them very brief. The Christian Observer, a new-school Presbyterian organ, of first-class, spoke in this tone, and at such length, by a correspondent:

    MEXICO is OPEN!—Mexico is open to Christian, as well as commercial enterprise.

    "Our countrymen are protected in the prosecution of their lawful business, and so would our citizens be in the sale or gratuitous circulation of Spanish Bibles, tracts and bound volumes.

    "These books are on the shelves of our depositories. Why should they remain there, when now they may be placed in the hands of the population at Matamoras, Monterey, Tampico, Vera Cruz, Jalapa, Perote, Puebla, etc., etc.?

    "Will those whose obligations bind them to this circulation, answer this question?

    The sword has opened the way.

    "Our officers and soldiers themselves need all the kindly influences we can exert on them. They will gratefully receive these publications, and bless their benefactors.

    "Shall we withhold them from the men who fight the [pro-slavery expansion] battles of the country? Many of the officers and soldiers, particularly among the volunteers, are church members, and will rejoice in such an enterprise.

    "Colporteurs [preachers] can be found on the ground. Discharged volunteers will remain, and instead of shooting balls, will love to do good, and communicate to the millions perishing around them, the word of life.

    "What is my duty as an AMERICAN CHRISTIAN?

    "Let the hundreds of thousands of Christian freemen in our land answer that question.

    "If Captain Bragg gave "a little more grape" [cannon fire at Mexicans defending their country from U.S. agression] and turned [caused] the victory, why may not the sons of peace and righteousness follow up that [military slaughter] victory, with all

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    those missiles and weapons which are mighty through God to the pulling down of strongholds? [2 Cor. 10:4]. It must be done.

    "It is the great movement of the present century. Who will lead the advance?

    J. C. S.

    And this one more, from the Nashville, Tennessee, Union:

    "At a Missionary meeting, held in the Methodist church, on Monday night, funds were raised for making General [Zachary] Taylor, Colonel Campbell, Colonel Anderson, Captain Cheatham, and Captain Foster, life-members of the Conference Missionary society. These compliments will be duly appreciated by the brave officers, who are winning laurels on the field of battle."

    So did the government and the governing part and power of the vile, demonized, heathen-while-professing-"Christian" church, cooperate in fighting and robbing to extend, as well as support slavery.

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    CHAPTER XV.

    ACTS OF PRO-SLAVERY APOSTLES—GENERAL ASSEMBLY
    OF THE PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH—AMERICAN BOARD
    OF COMMISSIONERS FOR FOREIGN MISSIONS—THE
    BAPTIST CHURCH—METHODIST EPISCOPAL CHURCH—
    PROTESTANT EPISCOPAL CHURCH—CAMPBELLITES—
    AMERICAN BIBLE AND TRACT SOCIETIES—
    FUGITIVE SLAVE LAW.

    A long chapter this may be, though it is last but one, and that one, readers may be glad to know, will not be long. The charges against the church and clergy may be sweeping and severe. All that is now proposed is to submit their own recorded, printed, published testimony in support of them. In scripture phrase, "By their own words shall they be justified, or condemned." [Matt. 12:37]

    For convenience, the great representative ecclesiastical bodies will be considered separately, beginning with the General Assembly of the Presbyterian church. Notwithstanding its powerful testimony against sla- very, so late as 1818, as has been shown, it grew to be one of the boldest blasphemers against the holy spirit of freedom the world has produced. And the New-school assembly, after the memorable separation into old and new schools, became quite as unscrupulous as the other. Though slavery had little or nothing to do in dividing the body, the new school was much the strongest in the northern states.

    In the new-school general assembly, in 1840, a motion was made, by a member, on the subject of slavery, when Rev. Dr. Cox, of Brooklyn, immediately

    -386-

    moved its indefinite postponement. On the motion being carried, he exultingly exclaimed: "Our Vesuvius is capped safely for three years," that being the time for the next meeting. And Judge Birney assures us that Dr. Cox was at the first an abolitionist.

    The clergy of the old-school were even more demonstrative in opposition to anything like hostility to the "peculiar institution." When the Richmond ministers held a meeting, expressly to wash their hands clean before all the world, of any anti-slavery stain, Dr. William L. Plummer was absent; but on his return, he made haste to assure his acceptance and approval of the action taken, by a letter to the committee of correspondence, from which these are extracts:

    "I have carefully watched this matter from its earliest existence, and everything I have seen or heard of its character, both from its patrons and its enemies, has confirmed me beyond repentance, in the belief, that, let the character of abolitionists be what it may in the sight of the judge of all the earth, this is the most meddlesome, impudent, reckless, fierce, and wicked excitement I ever saw.

    "If abolitionists will set the country in a blaze, it is but fair that they should receive the first warming at the fire.

    "Abolitionists are like infidels, wholly unaddicted to martyrdom for opinion's sake. Let them understand that they will be caught [lynched] if they come among us, and they will take good heed to keep out of our way. There is not one man among them who has any more idea of shedding his blood in this cause than he has of making war on the grand Turk."

    To these instances of clerical devotion to the worship of the bloody idol, Judge Birney adds this; a letter from a reverend divine, announcing his inten-

    -387-


    (pp 388-403)

    the board reported its work done in the Choctaw nation, and in 1860, in the Cherokee, and gave its legitimate, logical reason:

    "The Cherokees are a Christian people." * * *

    " * * * "The committee have arrived at the conclusion that it is time to discontinue its expenditures among the Cherokees. To prevent all misapprehension, it should be stated at the outset: First, that this is not owing to the relations of our work among those Indians to the system of slavery."

    The Choctaw mission was similarly closed, in 1859.

    O, no! "Slavery had nothing to do with it!" The board found slavery among the Indians in 1817, accepted it as of divine appointment, and compelled its missionaries to accept it, and they did; as did the churches and pulpits that sustained them. When the anti-slavery agitation reached to the churches, and protests were sent up against a slave-holding religion, supported at home, and sent abroad to the heathen, the Board refused to interfere.

    And once when the Sandwich Island missionaries sent home a most powerful remonstrance against slave-holding in the churches as a hindrance to their missionary work as well as false to the true Christian faith, the Board suppressed their testimony, and by solemn resolution duly adopted, recorded and published, virtually imposed silence on the subject, at every missionary station under its patronage. When the interest on the subject began to threaten loss to the treasury, then the Board by its Secretaries attempted, by argument to justify slavery as supported by scripture; by patriarchal practice and apostolic approval, the very chiefest apostle [Paul] actually, as was [falsely] claimed, voluntarily restoring a runaway slave to his owner. From 1817 to 1860, more than forty years, did the Board conduct the religious and moral

    -404-

    education of those Indian tribes, gathering them into churches: masters and slaves alike, with this law in full force:
    "No slave, or child of a slave, is to be taught to read or write, in or at any school, by any one connected in any capacity therewith, on pain of dismissal and expulsion from the nation."

    And now one thought more, and the Board and all its work shall be discharged from further consideration.

    In 1860 the Cherokees, and in 1859 the Choctaws, were graduated by the Board from paganism to Christianity with full credentials, as no longer in the darkness of the heathen world. In 1861, the war of Rebellion set the country on fire. The Indian tribes were early awake to the situation. The New York Evangelist, on the 21st of March of the same year, 1861, said: "the Cherokee, Choctaw, and other Indian tribes of the south-west, nearly all of them slave-holders, are evidently under the influence of the secessionists. The principal Choctaw chief hastened to convene the local legislature * * * and recommended a general council of the Chickasaws, Creeks, Seminoles and Choctaws to be held at a central point for the purpose of adopting some line of policy necessary to their security."

    In August following, the New York Journal of Commerce announced that: "The Choctaws, Creeks, Seminoles and Chickasaws have given their adherence to the Confederates, and probably the Cherokees are divided on the question."

    Of the rest, we know enough. How well and truly was it said at the opening of the war of Rebellion, "in the forty-two years of the maintenance of the Cherokee and Choctaw missions, by the American Board,

    -405-

    they have connived at slavery, avoiding, by various dishonorable and dishonest means and contrivances, the hard duty of reformation. Now they go a step further, spontaneously and publicly vouching for slave-holding churches as christian churches, and for a nation upholding the worst form of slavery, as "a Christian people."

    And between four and five thousand armed Indian warriors, led by an able Boston born general, the tallest, handsomest officer in the rebel army, at the battle of Pea Ridge, fighting in a war waged by slave-holders and waged wholly for slavery, and nothing else, was a spectacle worthy the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions!

    THE BAPTIST CHURCH.

    Or if we turn to the Baptist denomination with its vast proportion in the slave states, the record will not improve; and in that again we can learn its spirit and position through its great national Foreign Missionary Association known in early anti-slavery days as The Baptist Triennial Convention. The harmony in it seems never to have been disturbed by the slavery problem till broken by the tocsin of the abolitionists. For so late as the year 1834, Rev. Dr. Bolles, of Boston, one of its Secretaries of correspondence in an official paper, said:

    "There is a pleasing degree of union among the multiplying thousands of Baptists throughout the land. * * * Our southern brethren are generally slave-holders, both ministers and people." [See Parody].

    And another Boston Baptist doctor of divinity, Rev. Daniel Sharp, wrote under date January 21st, 1840:

    "There were undoubtedly both slave-holders and slaves in the primitive churches; I therefore for one, do not feel myself at liberty to make conditions of commun-

    -406-

    ion which neither Christ nor his apostles made. I do not feel myself wiser nor better than were they; * * * and I believe that a majority of the wisest and best men at the north hold to these sentiments." [Ed. Note: Rebutted by Rev. John Fee, in An Anti-Slavery Manual, pages 110-121]

    In 1841, at the Triennial convention and by appointment, a slave-holder presided, another slave-holder performed the devotional exercises, and a third slave-holder preached the Triennial sermon; and the Rev. Elon Galusha, of New York, an earnest, outspoken anti-slavery man, was removed from the Board of Management, partly, or principally, from demands like this of the Camden, South Carolina Baptist church:

    Resolved, That we view with contempt, the advice, opinions, menaces and declarations of Elon Galusha and his coadjuutors contained in their address to southern Baptists.

    Resolved, That we recommend to our associations to use their influence to have Elon Galusha expelled from his office as Vice-President of the Board of Foreign Missions.

    The fifth, sixth and seventh, ran thus:

    Resolved, That we extend to northern Baptists who are opposed to the abolitionists, our warmest affection and fraternal regard. They will ever have an interest in our prayers.

    Resolved, That the address of Elon Galusha be returned to him, with request that he will never again insult us with an address of any kind.

    Resolved, That these proceedings be published in the Christian Index, The Biblical Recorder, Religious Herald, New York Baptist Advocate, and Camden Journal.
    C. M. BLEEKER, Chairman,
    E. G. ROBINSON, Secretary.

    And as already told, Mr. Galusha was removed. All the proceedings appeared to have been in keeping

    -407-

    with such expulsion; for the meeting closed with the sacramental supper and singing:

    "Lo, what an entertaining sight
    Are brethren who agree!"

    A member writing to the Biblical Recorder and Southern Watchman, thus rejoices:

    "Our meeting was truly delightful. The spirit of the gospel prevailed, and gave a tremendous shock to the abolitionists. Let us be thankful to God, and give him the glory. And now, if we of the south and they of the north, whose sympathies are with us, shall be mild, I am satisfied that abolitionism will go down among Baptists. All our "principal men" are sound to the core on this vexed question.

    "The Triennial Convention exhibited a noble spectacle of moral grandeur. About two hundred and fifty men from the various parts of our extended country were engaged in a long and arduous session, that tried the temper and put into requisition all the intellectual energy which they possessed. And all this in connection with a most exciting subject. And yet, self-possession, calmness, the Christian spirit, predominated throughout the whole scene. No tumult, no angry feeling, no harsh expression had place in our deliberations and conclusions. At the communion board on Lord's day the scene was overwhelming. In view of the cross the hundreds that participated were all one. No test, other than that of our dear Lord's requirement, was thought of. To God be all the glory, Amen and Amen.

    But such dissatisfaction arose among the now "principal men" in the convention that before the next Triennial gathering a division occurred. A new but small rival society was formed. One principal reason assigned being that gifts of slave-holders should not mingle with northern contributions in the missionary treasury, since God had said "I hate robbery for a burnt offering."

    -408-

    But the extent of principle and height of integrity of this new and sublimated movement, was seen in the fact, that when, just afterwards, the old board sustained a loss by a failure in India, there was an immediate appropriation of five hundred dollars voted to it, with all its slavery, out of this purified treasury. The following is the official record of the proceeding:

    "Whereas, The Foreign Mission Board have recently sustained a heavy loss, by the failure of their banker at Calcutta, and thus appropriated supplies are cut off from the missionaries in Asia; therefore

    "Resolved, That the treasurer of this committee be instructed to forward, as soon as possible, five hundred dollars from funds now in the treasury, to the relief of the missionaries, "to be expended under the direction of Dr. Judson and Mr. Vinton."

    [Signed] S. G. SHIPLEY, Chairman.
    C.W. DENISON, Secretary."

    The new association seems to have been short lived, for at the next meeting of the old board, all parties old and new were present, and the proceedings were as unanimous almost as before slavery had ever disturbed them. The president, a North Carolina slave-holder, declined a reelection, on the ground that, as for more than thirty years the chief officer had been selected from the slave states, it was time the boon should be conferred on the north. Accordingly, the Rev. Dr. [Francis] Wayland, of Providence, on the second ballotting, was elected to that office.

    The subject of Slavery was introduced and disposed of by the passage of the following resolution, ONLY TWO voting in the negative:

    "Resolved, That cooperating together as members of this convention in the work of foreign missions, we disclaim all sanction, either express or implied, of slavery or anti-slavery; but as individuals we are free to express and promote our view on this or other subjects, in a Christian manner and spirit."

    -409-

    Rev. Mr. Davis, of New York, [neighbor of Elon Galusha] then remarked with much exultation, if not exaltation, that the convention had passed a stupendous crisis and moved a season of devotional exercises. The season was voted, a northern minister, Mr. Webb, of Philadelphia, gave thanks, and they closed with singing the Doxology, by the congregation,

    "Praise God, from whom all blessings flow."

    In view of the passage of the above resolution, the editor of the Boston Christian Reflector, a professedly anti-slavery journal, most complacently remarked:

    "It will be seen by the passage of the resolution on Friday, that we are no longer required to fellowship slavery or slave-holders, as such, in the work of missions."

    But had the business related to infant sprinkling instead of infant stealing, or on immersion as baptism, instead of sprinkling, the whole past history of this immense denomination throughout Christendom proves it would never have been so easily nor so amicably adjusted.

    In 1846, a new association was incorporated under the name of "The American Baptist Missionary Union," and the old triennial was no more. The first article of the new constitution designates the name, the second the object of the society. The third provides that "persons," without reference to place, "may be life members, by the payment at one time of not less than one hundred dollars." The twenty-first article declares that the officers and missionaries of the association "shall be members in good standing of regular Baptist churches." No north nor south any more.

    It has been contended that this association was formed with particular reference to a separation from slavery. I was so informed by an officer of the board.

    -410-

    But there was no such intimation, either in the act of incorporation or the constitution. Among the life members were persons from Missouri, Mississippi, Delaware, and Georgia; and the first meeting of the board of managers was organized by the choice of a president from a free, and a secretary from a slave state. The first meeting of the union was opened with prayer by the Rev. Nathaniel Colver, of Boston. All these proceedings, and others, are appended to the annual report of the old Baptist convention for 1846.

    But enough about the mission movements as between south and north, or between slavery and anti-slavery. The Baptist denomination, like the others, had hosts of anti-slavery men and women; but the ruling power was for slavery, or the system could not have survived as it did, till stove down by the avenging bolts of eternal wrath.

    METHODIST EPISCOPAL CHURCH.

    Coming now to the mighty Methodist denomination it would be a relief and joy if a far better record could be given. But to write history, not make it, is the work still in hand.

    Two copies of the Methodist Book of Discipline are before me, of different dates, but both contain an address "To the Members of the Methodist Episcopal Church," signed by the bishops, in which it is declared:

    "We wish to see this little publication in the house of every Methodist. And the more so, as it contains the articles of religion, maintained more or less, in part, or in whole, by every reformed church in the world. Far from wishing you to be ignorant of any of our doctrines, or any part of our discipline, we wish you to read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest the whole. You ought, next to the word of God, to procure the

    -411-


    (pp 412-425)

    THE PROTESTANT EPISCOPAL CHURCH.

    The anti-slavery character of this denomination is pretty clearly set forth in a pamphlet, entitled, "Thoughts on the duty of the Episcopal church in relation to slavery," by the late William [John] Jay, one of its most illustrious members:

    Alas! for the expectation that she would conform to the spirit of her ancient mother.

    She has not only remained a mute and careless spectator of this great conflict of truth and justice with hypocrisy and cruelty, but her very priests and deacons may be seen ministering at the altar of slavery! Offering their talents and influence at its unholy shrine, and openly repeating the awful blasphemy that the precepts of our Savior sanction the system of American slavery!

    Her northern, free-state clergy, with rare exceptions, whatever they may feel on the subiect, rebuke it neither in public nor in private.

    And her periodicals, far from advancing the progress of abolitionism, at times oppose our societies; impliedly defending slavery, as not incompatible with christianity, and, occasionally withholding information useful to the cause of freedom.

    As why should they not, or, rather, it might be asked, how could they have done otherwise? pulpit, or press, with instructions like the following, issued by the oldest bishop in the United States, for their instruction and guidance, though directed, as will be seen, to a far more august dignitary than the bishop himself:

    Ed. Note: Pillsbury had reprinted this more fully in 1847, in Forlorn Church, pp 51-53; and see related parody, pp 326-327, supra.

    JUBILEE COLLEGE, ILLINOIS, N. A., }
    August 1, A. D. 1846.   }

    To the Right Rev. Samuel, Lord Bishop of Oxford, England;

    VERY DEAR BROTHER IN THE LORD JESUS—Allow me, the oldest bishop of the "Protestant Episcopal church" in the United States, to address your lordship on the subject of a pamphlet, entitled "A Re-

    -426-

    proof of the American Church," which "reproof" is said to be contained in copious "extracts" from your lordship's lately published history of said church.

    Ed. Note: Full citation: Samuel Wilberforce, M.A. (1805-1873), A Reproof of the American Church by the Bishop of Oxford, extracted from a "History of the Protestant Episcopal Church in America" (New York, W. Harned, 1846), retitled and reprinted as, A Reproof of the American Church on the Subject of Slavery (London: W. Tweedie, 1853)
    See also Samuel Wilberforce, and Evan Malbone Johnson, A History of the Protestant Episcopal Church in America (New York, Stanford and Swords, 1849)
    Reprints show this letter did not persuade.

    Never having read this work from which the said "reproof" is drawn, yet from many years' acquaintance with your lordship's excellent character, I can say, with full confidence, that the acerbity which is spread over the pages of this pamphlet cannot be approved by your lordship. * * *

    In the deepest sorrow of heart do I lament the melancholy effects produced by the circumstances before me. Alas! what do I see? The bishops and clergy of America censured for that of which they are not guilty, and of which they are not the cause, and those who censure them evidently unconscious both of the evils which their mistaken censure produces, and of the extent of the evils which must follow from the weight of their character and opinion.

    Ed. Note: Yes, people will realize American churches are villainous.

    Before I proceed, I beg leave to state, that, in endeavoring, by mv feeble means, to shield the Protestant Episcopal church in the United States, I crave to be understood as not assuming political ground.

    The Episcopal church in America did in no wise originate slavery. She always, in connection with other benevolent persons of the day, raised her voice against its introduction into the then British colonies.

    Nor is she now, in any competent sense, a part of the civil government to cure its temporal evils. Her bishops are not, as the English prelates are, admitted to a seat in the halls of legislation, nor are they allowed to "rise in their places" to plead the cause of humanity.

    All she can do [says this fatalist] is by her prayers and the preaching of the gospel, and teaching the blessed doctrines of christianity, to endeavor to ameliorate the condition of the slave; but, like the primitive christians amidst the evils that surround her, she does not think herself called upon to eradicate at once the evil.

    Ed. Note: See rebuttal by Harriet B. Stowe, Key (1853), pp 205-223 and 228-243.
    Note that this immoral man refuses to say, the Church can
  • teach that slavery is a sin
  • stop retaining and promoting slavers
  • follow 1 Cor. 5:1, 4-5 precedent, excom-municating blatant sinners, slaveholders.
    Remember pro-slavery clergy motive, concubines for themselves.
  • She [the Church] rather finds herself commanded, as were the servants in the gospel, to exercise caution, "lest in eradicating the tares, they root out the wheat also." Let both grow together, saith our Lord. [Matthew 13:29-30]. Let the evil be borne [retained] for the sake of the good that may be done to the souls of the poor slaves.

    Ed. Note: Not so. The "wheat and tares" message does not mean
  • admitting into the church persons with an unrepentant lifestyle, overt, blatant sinful acts, or harming-others behavior
  • don't warn people away from sin.
    The end of "tares" is burning, referring to the blatant unrepentant.

  • -427-

    "The tenor of these remarks falls in with the example of St. Paul.

    Ed. Note: Not so. Paul set an example of excommunicating the unrepentant sinner. 1 Cor. 1:1, 4-5, as per Matthew 18:15-17.

    "The gospel tbrough his mouth, and the power of the divine Spirit, had converted the noble Philemon from the slavery of sin to the freedom of the Son of God.

    "This Philemon's 'run-away slave' enjoyed the same benefit at the hands of the same apostle, some time after, while a prisoner in the city of Rome. His name was Onesimus, and while ministering to the necessities of the holy apostle, he heard the word of God, and like his master, believed.

    "It now becomes a matter of great importance, in relation to the subject of this letter, to know what directions the apostle gave to the converted slave of Philemon, when he sent him back to his master.

    "Was it that he was a freeman in the temporal sense, and must maintain his rights as a part of 'a whole gospel'? Was it that as a freeman he was to go back and claim the privileges and immunities of this his temporal freedom, as it is now understood by the abolitionists?

    "Was it that henceforth he was to consider himself as having a right to propagate his sentiments and "preach the whole gospel'?

    "That is to say, that he had a right to creep into his former master's kitchen and fill the heads of all the [alleged] bond-servants with the ideas of their temporal rights according to this creed, thereby exciting them to rebellion, and if resisted (and resisted they certainly would be), to murder their kind master and take possession of his estate?

    "Far, very far from so wicked an estimate of the holy religion unto the blessings and privileges of which the apostle had admitted him, this now converted servant of the pious Philemon, that he sent the former immediately back to serve the latter as heretofore.

    "Not a word of abolitionism was uttered in the presence of Onesimus, or intimated by the apostle.

    Ed. Note: For honest analysis of Philemon, see
  • Rev. John Fee, Anti-Slavery Manual (1851), pp 109-110
  • Rev. George B. Cheever, God Against Slavery (1857), pp 140-147
  • Rev. Stephen Foster, Thieves (1843), pp 48-49.
  • "He [Paul] entreats Philemon to receive his servant back again as a brother beloved of Christ, though still a servant, and as such, if required, engages to pay the losses he had occasioned his master by his leaving him.

    "'If he hath wronged thee aught, put that to my account, I Paul have written it with my own hand, I will repay it.'

    "How different this from the language of modern abolitionism! Yet this, my Lord, is a part of our Holy Bible."

    -428-

    "Hence it is clearly to be inferred [assumed] that the [sinful] relations of political society are to continue, be they what they may, notwithstanding the most intimate ties of Christian fellowship."

    Ed. Note: The letter-writer disregards

  • Christ's teaching vs. traditions of men: Matt. 15:3, 6, 9; Mark 7:7-9, 13; Colos. 2:8

  • Peter saying, rather obey God: Acts 5:29

  • slavery unconstitutionality.

  • Here is another singularly illustrative act, furnished, too, as is all the testimony introduced—by the [pretended Christian] church itself.

    In 1836 Rev. George W. Freeman delivered two sermons in Raleigh, North Carolina, that were published under the imposing title of "The Rights and Duties of Slave-holders," with the following imprimatur from Bishop Ives, of the diocese:

    "RALEIGH, Nov. 30, 1836.

    "REV. AND DEAR BROTHER:—I listened with most unfeigned pleasure to the discourses delivered last Sunday, on the character of slavery and the duties of masters.

    "And as I learn a publication of them is solicited, I beg, from a conviction of their being urgently called for at the present time, that you will not withhold your consent.

    "Your affectionate friend and brother in the Lord,

    "L. S. IVES."

    In South Carolina, the "Society for the Advancement of Christianity," made up of clergymen and laymen, the bishop at the head of it, seized upon the sermons, imprimatur and all, and published them as religious tracts, for gratuitous distribution.

    Ed. Note: Full citation: George W. Freeman (1789-1858), The Rights and Duties of Slaveholders: Two Discourses Delivered on Sunday, November 27, 1836, in Christ Church, Raleigh, North Carolina (Raleigh: J. Gales & son, 1836)

    An extract from the [vile and heathen, pro-slavery] sermons read thus:

    "No man or set of men in our day, unless they can produce a new Revelation from heaven, are entitled to pronounce slavery wrong. * * *

    Ed. Note: Rejecting the current revelation!

    "Slavery, as it exists at the present day, is agreeable to the order of Divine Providence."

    And now one more witness, perhaps most valuable of all, and a late bishop, too. On my table is a work with this imposing title:

    Sermons addressed to masters and and servants and published in the year 1743, by Rev. Thomas Bacon [c. 1700-1768], minister

    -429-

    of the Protestant Episcopal Church in Maryland, now republished with other tracts and dialogues on the same subject, and recommended to all masters and mistresses to be used in their families. By the Reverend William Meade. Winchester, Virginia. John Heiskell, printer.

    Ed. Note: Pillsbury had reprinted an excerpt in 1847, in Forlorn Church, pp 14-18; and see the parody, pp 326-327, supra.

    In his preface, Bishop [William] Meade [1789-1862] remarks:

    "The editor of this volume offers it to all masters and mistresses in our southern states, with the anxious wish and devout prayer that it may prove a blessing to themselves and their households.

    "He considers himself most happy in having met with the several pieces which compose it, and could not with a quiet conscience refrain from affording to others the opportunity of profiting thereby."

    The title of this work shows its miscellaneous character. The sermons are in two series, the first, doubtless, by Mr. Bacon published in 1743. Then succeed two others, author not named, but presumably by Bishop Meade himself, and always so assigned while he lived [1789-1862]. And from them the following excerpts are taken.

    He first [purportedly] shows that God appointed, for great and wonderfui ends [purposes], several offices and degrees in his family, making some masters and mistresses, some kings and rulers, some merchants and sea-faring men, some tradesmen, husbandmen and planters and laboring men to work for their own living, and some He hath made servants and slaves to assist and work for their masters and mistresses who provide for them.

    Ed. Note: The vile, demonized, heathen Bishop Meade disregards the fact that
  • God made all men equal, Gen. 1:26, 28, to rule fish, fowl, cattle, creeping things, and animals, not each other
  • ranks are "traditions of men."
    Meade has "divine right of kings" notion.
    This comes from English Toryism.
    America rejected monarchy/aristocracy.
  • And as God hath sent each of us into the world for some or other of these purposes, we are all obliged, from the king to the poorest slave, to do the business He hath set us about.

    And while you whom He hath made slaves are honestly and quietly doing your business and living as poor christians ought to live, you are serving God in your low station as much as the greatest prince alive.

    -430-

    With more in the same strain, but not one duty specified, not one grace, not one emotion nor aspiration that rises above, or relates to any power or person, only the master and mistress and their service and adoration, as what follows, in the recent bishop's own words, abundantly shows:

    "When people die, we know of but two places they have to go to, and one is heaven, the other hell. Now heaven is a place of great happiness, which God has prepared for all that are good, where they shall enjoy rest from their labors.

    "And hell is a place of great torment and misery, where all wicked people will be shut up with the devil and other evil spirits, and be punished forever, because they will not serve God.

    "If, therefore we would have our souls saved hy Christ, if we would escape hell and obtain heaven, we must set about doing what he requires of us, that is, to serve God.

    "Your own poor circumstances in this life ought to put you particularly upon this, and taking care of your souls. * *

    "Almighty God hath been pleased to make you slaves here, and to give you nothing but labor and poverty in this world, which you are obliged to submit to, as it is his will that it should be so.

    "And think within yourselves what a terrible thing it would be, after all your labors and sufferings in this life, to be turned into hell in the next life: and after wearing out your bodies in service here, to go into a far worse slavery when this is over, and your poor souls be delivered over into the possession of the devil, to become his slaves forever in hell, without any hope of ever getting free from it.

    "If, therefore, you would be God's freemen in heaven, you must strive to be good and serve him here on earth.

    "Your bodies, you know, are not your own: they are at the disposal of those you belong to; but your precious souls are still your own, which nothing can take from you, if it be not your own fault.

    "Consider well, then, that if you lose your souls by leading idle, wicked lives here, you have got nothing by it in this world, and you have lost your all in the next. For your idleness and wickedness are generally found out, and your

    -431-

    bodies suffer for it here; and, what is far worse, if you do not repent and amend, your unhappy souls will suffer for it hereafter.

    "Having thus shown you the chief duties you owe to your great Master in heaven, I now come to lay before you the duties you owe to your masters and mistresses here upon earth.

    Ed. Note: This vile individual carefully avoids offering proof,
  • avoiding the issues Harriet B. Stowe raised,
  • including Southern clergy not preaching the real gospel, merely alleged "duties,"
  • and not citing Bible criteria;
  • avoiding citing the sinfulness of slavery as shown by clergy such as Rev. John Fee
  • and Rev. George Cheever;
  • and avoiding the issue of the unconstitutionality of slavery.
    Southern clergy took a pro-slavery position, to have slave concubines for themselves, p 74.
  • "And for this you have one general rule that you ought always to carry in your minds, and that is, to do all service for them, as if you did it for God himself.

    "Poor creatures! you little consider when you are idle and neglectful of your master's business, when you steal and waste, and hurt any of their substance, when you are saucy and impudent, when you are telling them lies and deceiving them, or when you prove stubborn and sullen, and will not do the work you are set about without stripes and vexation; you do not consider, I say, that what faults you are guilty of towards your masters and mistresses, are faults done against God himself who hath set your masters and mistresses over you in his own stead, and expects that you will do for them just as you would do for him.

    "Pray do not think I want to deceive you, when I tell you that your masters and mistresses are God's overseers; and that if you are faulty towards them, God himself will punish you severely for it in the next world, unless you repent. * *

    Ed. Note: This vile or demonized "clergyman" sees their suspicion! a correct suspicion that he is a deceiver, himself of the devil. 2 Cor. 11:13-15.

    "You are to be obedient and subject to your masters in all things.

    Ed. Note: He means especially when the "choice stock" are made concubines for clergy.

    And christian ministers are commanded to exhort servants to be obedient unto their own masters [not to kidnappers, but employers], and to please them well in all things.

    "You are to be faithful and honest to your masters and mistresses; not purloining or wasting their goods or substance, but showing all good fidelity in all things.

    "Do not your masters, under God, provide for you?

    Ed. Note: See examples.

    "And how shall they be able to do this, to feed and to clothe you, unless you take honest care of every thing that belongs to them?

    "Remember, God requires this of you, and if you are not afraid of suffering for it in this world, you cannot escape the vengeance of Almighty God.

    Ed. Note: This demonized "clergyman" does not mention consequences to 'masters and mistresses' for their manstealing! despite the Bible data, e.g.,
  • Joseph
  • the Patriarchs
  • Moses
  • the Hebrew covenant
  • Ancient Israel's penalty
  • Christ's example
  • Church history, etc.
  • Ed. Note: Also by Vile Bishop Meade:

    Pastoral Letter of the Rt. Rev. William Meade, Asst. Bishop of Va., to the Ministers, Members, and Friends, of the Protestant Episcopal Church in the Diocese of Virginia, on the Duty of Affording [Pretended] Religious Instruction to Those in Bondage. Delivered in the Year 1834 - Reprinted by the Convocation of Central Virginia in 1853 (Richmond: H. K. Ellyson, 1853)
    Address on the Day of Fasting and Prayer Appointed by [Jefferson Davis] the President of the Confederate States, June 13, 1861, Delivered at Christ Church, Millwood, Va (Richmond: Enquirer and Job Press, 1861)

    Turning now to the next sermon, page 116 of the volume, the bishop expounds, reasons, and argues to this effect:

    -432-

    "All things whatsoever ye would, that men should do unto you, do ye even so unto them;" that is, do by all mankind just as you would desire they should do by you, if you were in their place, and they in yours.

    "Now, to suit this rule to your particular circumstances; suppose you were masters and mistresses [kidnappers, murderers, rapists, thugs, etc.] and had servants under you, would you not desire that your servants should do their business faithfully and honestly, as well when your back was turned as while you were looking over them?

    Ed. Note: A proper analogy would be, would you not desire to call the police? or to commit standard self-defense acts? up to and including killing the perpetrator(s)?

    "Would you not expect that they should take notice of what you said to them? That they should behave themselves with respect towards you and yours, and be as careful of everything belonging to you as you would be yourselves?

    "You are servants, do, therefore, as you would wish to be done by, and you will be both good servants to your master, and good servants to God, who requires this of you, and will reward you well for it, if you do it for the sake of conscience, in obedience to his commands. * * *

    "Take care that you do not fret, or murmur, or grumble at your condition; for this will not only make your life uneasy, but will greatly offend Almighty God.

    "Consider that it is not yourselves, it is not the people you belong to, it is not the men that have brought you to it, but it is the will of God who hath by his providence made you servants, because, no doubt he knew that condition would be best for you in this world, and help you the better towards heaven, if you would but do your duty in it.

    "So that any discontent at your not being free, or rich, or great as you see some others, is quarreling with your heavenly Master, and finding fault with God himself. * * *

    "There is only one circumstance which may appear grievous, that I shall now take notice of, and that is CORRECTION.

    Ed. Note: This sicko pervert Meade means torture.

    "Now, when correction is given you, you either deserve it, or you do not deserve it. But whether you really deserve it or not, it is your duty, and Almighty God requires that you bear it patiently.

    Ed. Note: Sicko pervert Meade would not tell this BS to whites captured by Indians.

    "You may, perhaps, think that this is hard doctrine, but if you consider it right, you must needs think otherwise of it.

    "Suppose, then, that you deserve correction, you cannot

    -433-

    but say that it is just and right you should meet with it.

    "Suppose you do not, or at least you do not deserve so much or so severe a correction for the fault you have committed, you perhaps have escaped a great many more, and are at least paid for all.

    "Or suppose you are quite innocent of what is laid to your charge, and suffer wrongfully in that particular thing, is it not possible you may have done some other bad thing which was never discovered, and that Almighty God, who saw you doing it, would not let you escape without punishment one time or another?

    "And ought you not in such a case to give glory to Him, and be thankful that he would rather punish you, in this life for your wickedness, than destroy your souls for it in the next life?

    "But suppose that even this was not the case (a case hardly to be imagined), and that you have by no means, known or unknown, deserved the correction you suffered, there is this great comfort in it, that if you bear it patiently, and leave your cause in the hands of God, he will reward you for it in heaven, and the punishment you suffer unjustly here shall turn to your exceeding great glory hereafter."

    So much for Bishop Meade; his whole volume is a wonderful exposition and illumination of the whole slave system, as related to, or rather sanctified by the American church, almost irrespective of denomination.

    Judge Birney, might have reproduced these extracts in his luminous tract on slavery and the church, and on them alone, so far as the Episcopal body is concerned, have rested his case forever.

    The whole volume of Bishop Meade contains two hundred and fifty pages of solid apology for, and justification of slavery as then existing at the south, in the name of the Christian religion, its Christ and God.

    Ed. Note: Never forget the clergy purpose in defending slavery: concubines for themselves.

    No other copy of it has ever come to my knowledge. For it, I was indebted to the kindness of my excellent friend, Mr. Samuel Brooke, a native Virginian himself. He was born a Friend or Quaker, one of a family of four or five brothers, ail excellent men who early

    -434-

    removed into Ohio and became earnest, working abolitionists, eminently hospitable to anti-slavery lecturers, both men and women; besides being large proprietors in the underground railroad; and frequently running its nightly and well loaded trains, themselves.

    And my friend, Samuel Brooke, who gave me Bishop Meade, was long an active anti-slavery agent, and for a number of years, general agent of the Western Anti-Slavery Society, and since slavery was abolished, an officer in the revenue department of the government service.

    But a word more on the Protestant Episcopal church and its defense and reverend defenders of the terrible slave system. For besides Bishop Meade, another eminent divine has left us his volume of sermons, now on my table. It contains twenty-six discourses, and the title-page reads thus:

    "Sermons preached on plantations to congregations of negroes, by the Rev. Alexander Glennie, rector of All Saints parish, Waccamaw, S. C., Charleston, S. C. Published and sold by A. E. Miller, number 4 Broad street, 1844.

    In his preface, Dr. Glennie says:

    "The following sermons were written for the benefit of the colored portion of my flock. As the want [lack] of simple sermons, suited to the capacity of negroes, is frequently spoken of, I have made this selection from among those which I have been writing for several years past, and publish them in the hope that catechisists and religious masters may find them of use."

    The fourth sermon of the twenty-six is precisely in tone and sentiment like the quotations from Bishop Meade. Readers, therefore, could not be interested in them. Let this one exclamation suffice. The text is:

    "With good will doing service as to the Lord and not to men." The first utterance is in two lines: "In this part of the word of God, servants are taught

    -435-

    with what mind they should do their service." And then this exclamation: "What a blessed book the Bible is, my brethren!"

    And the law of the state at that moment, punished with twenty lashes any slave found in any assembly convened for mental instruction, held in any secret place, though in presence of white persons.

    And an older law, never repealed, punished with fine of a hundred pounds, any person who should teach a slave to write.

    In North Carolina, to teach a slave to read or to sell, or give a slave any book, Bible or tract not excepted, was thirty-nine lashes, if the offender were a free negro; or, if a white person, a fine of two hundred dollars.

    Ed. Note: For more on Southern reading-ban laws, see
  • Charles Sumner, Barbarism, p 134
  • Rev. Stephen Foster's Brotherhood (1843), p 35
  • Rev. Silas McKeen's Scriptural Argument (1848), p 8
  • Rev. John Rankin's Letters (1823), pp 21-23
  • Rep. Horace Mann, Slavery and the Slave-Trade . . . .
    (Washington, D.C.: 1849), p 24
  • Rev. Wm. Goodell's Slavery and Anti-Slavery
    (1852), pp 189-190 and 210-213.

    The evil, atheist, demonized basis for slavers' banning reading by slaves includes the slaver / creationist dogma that blacks were not human but instead a separate species.
  • The reason given for this law was stated in the preamble, and read, in part, thus: That

    "teaching slaves to read and write tends to excite dissatisfaction in their minds and to produce insurrection and rebellion."

    Ed. Note: Readers learn
  • Constitutional rights
  • freedom rights
  • map-reading
  • directional signs
  • geographic locations,
    and escape!
  • More time and space have been given to the Episcopal church than was intended. Not by any means because that was more culpable than the other denominations; but the nature of the testimony adduced, appeared to throw more and clearer light on the relation between master and slave, and between both and the church, than almost any other, making incontestably certain that in church and clerical estimation, slaves had no religious rights which white saints were bound to respect here; nor any salvation hereafter, but such as must be worked out with "literal fear and trembling," in wholly secular service for such masters and mistresses as "God had set" to wield the lash over them.

    Ed. Note: Southern clergy did not preach the gospel of grace, to slaves. See H. B. Stowe, Key (1853), pp 244-250.

    To just such, and there were then three millions of them, and a fourth million being born, could Rev. Dr. Glennie, with deep [self-deluded] devotion, exclaim:

    "What a blessed book, my brethren, is the Bible!"

    -436-

    But let one more Episcopal bishop come into this court of inquiry and investigation; "the Right Rev. George W. Doane, bishop of New Jersey."

    For there may be worse, as well as better men than Dr. Glennie and Bishop Meade, and northern men, too. In 1857, or near, there was published in Philadelphia, an edition of the Episcopal "book of common prayer," marked by the authentic imprimatur of Bishop Doane.

    Christus Consolator, by Ary SchefferAt that time no works of religious art were more admired than those of [Dutch painter] Ary Scheffer [1795-1858], and not one of his more than his wonderful and deeply affecting "Christus Consolator."

    The New York Tribune shall tell the rest, in an article copied into the National Anti-Slavery Standard, of January 2d, 1858:


    All of our readers, we will venture to assume, are familiar with the engraving of Ary Scheffer's famous picture, entitled "Christus Consolator."

    They will remember that the Savior is seated

  • with the emblems of his divine compassion around him,

  • in the persons of the wretched beings whose diseases he had cured,

  • or whose sorrows he had ministered unto.
  • There is

  • the mother laying her dead infant at the sacred feet,

  • the sick man imploring the healing of the Almighty touch,

  • the maniac just restored to reason, with his broken chain in his deliverer's grasp,

  • the negro slave holding out his fettered hands for help and deliverance.
  • Everybody that has seen it will recall it all.

    Well, the Philadelphia publishers of the [Episcopal] prayer-book have selected this conception of Scheffer's as an appropriate ornament of its title-page.

    And, surely, they might have looked very far for a more fitting one; but they thought it needed some emendation [al;tering] and expurgation [censorship] before being put before the eyes of dainty christians in this land of churches and of cart-whips.

    The imploring face and the eloquent manacles of the slave might, perchance, disturb the devotions of [the vile, demonized, heathen] southern saints [!!], and even make the cotton-stuffed hassocks of many northern brethren uncomfortable to their knees.

    So, to remove this cause

    -437-


    (pp 438-477)

    information and evidence have been derived on the American Bible and Tract societies, and on the great leading, controlling, religious sects and organizations that represented the religious sentiment of the country at the beginning, and in the progress of the great anti-slavery conflict.

    And what must be the conclusion from it all? Judge Birney answered early: "The American churches: the bulwarks of American slavery." Stephen S. Foster replied later, in tones of thunder, "The Brotherhood of thieves; or a true picture of the American church and clergy."

    Then came a ringing voice from the west: "Slavery, and the slave-holder's Religion;" by Samuel Brooke, of Ohio, and still later: "The Church as it is: the Forlorn Hope of slavery," a larger pamphlet than the others.

    Nor were these all. And all pursuing the same course, which was to permit the accused to furnish all the testimony; not half, nor part, but the whole. Nor was there any cross questioning, nor inferential evidence, from beginning to end.

    What more could church or clergy have asked, unless in the language and spirit of those who demanded of the great teacher of Nazareth: "What have we to do with thee? let us alone!" Or what can this generation ask of us to-day? the very few of us who yet remain on earth? and in justice to ourselves and our cause, what less, or otherwise, could, or should we abolitionists, have done?

    -478-
    CHAPTER XVI.

    SOME PERSONAL SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES—A
    LAST SPEECH IN AN ANTI-SLAVERY ANNIVERSARY GATHERING.

    Returning now to the acts of the anti-slavery apostles, it should be explained that this long digression to the acts of another order of apostles became necessary after the work was begun, and extends it, too, beyond my original design. Within the past year, the enemies of the anti-slavery enterprise, or their children, have not only renewed their old calumnies against the faithful and uncompromising friends and advocates of that enterprise, but they have urged them with augmented aggravations. Their language need not be here reproduced. They themselves have given it to history and to posterity, and they and the sure years, will render a true and just verdict.

    But though the book has grown already beyond my purpose at the outset, it shall not close without at least some fraternal and friendly allusions to a few faithful men and noble women with whom I became acquainted in the lecturing field, each single one of whom deserves a volume of finer strains than mine.

    The Burleigh brothers, Charles C., and Cyrus M., came to the field almost in their boyhood, but valiant, vigorous as the young knights of chivalry, equal always to any encounter. Had Charles C. Burleigh pursued the profession of the law, as was his intention, there was no eminence he could not easily have reached. On the platform, in argument, he had no

    -479-

    superior and few equals. We always felt safe when Burleigh came to the stand. He never rose but when he had something to say. And, generally, when he had spoken, not much more was needed on the question in hand. With his pen, when he did write, he was not less mighty, as his "Thoughts on the Death Penalty," away back in 1845, proved. N. P. Rogers wrote of it in the Herald of Freedom:
    "I have gone over the 'Thoughts' as particularly as I am able to a book, and can witness to its being all that the reader has right to expect from the power of the writer. It is arranged with great Judgment and order, and winds about the poor old gallows tree an uninterupted chain for its destruction. Chain lightning, I wish it might prove, to strike and splinter it to its very roots, as I have seen a white pine, that had been just visited by one of these touches from the clouds. * * * A trimmer, abler, more masterly argument, has not been put together in words. Burleigh's antagonist is Dr. George B. Cheever. Burleigh doesn't leave a rag of his parson's gown on his back. Nobody makes an argument perfect and unanswerable but Charles Burleigh. Give him a good cause at the bar, as good as he has here, and let him speak firsthand the adversary council would never reply. The court wouldn't let him. His client wouldn't let him, not if he had common sense. The counsel wouldn't himself, for he wouldn't find an inch of ground left to start on. I never knew so absolute an arguer as Burleigh. And he has displayed himself completely in this work."

    A younger brother, Cyrus M. Burleigh, was an earnest, faithful worker in the lecture field, but fell an early victim to consumption. Amiable, gentle, com-

    -480-

    panionable, simple and sincere, he was ever well received, and most beloved and respected, where best known.

    Abby Kelley Foster and Lucy Stone both achieved enviable success in their anti-slavery work, not to speak of their ever abounding labors since in the cause of woman suffrage, to well fill a volume. And each has a brilliant and cultivated daughter, too, every way equal to its production. Mrs. Foster was in the lecturing field when I entered it, in 1840, and had been for a number of years. And she is the last survivor of those I found there who continued constantly in the conflict till the battle was won. She early entered to conquer or die, and nobly and bravely she kept her vow. Lucy Stone came later, but came not less with the spirit of hero and martyr, and came long before the period of peril, as well as of sacrifice and severe suffering was passed. I have seen her in truly ferocious mobs, that knew no distinction of sex nor color, race nor religion. I once saw her hit on the head with a large Swedenborgian prayer-book, hurled across the hall with a velocity and force worthy other cannons than the "sacred canons" of "holy church." A less severe blow, on a vital spot, has taken life. The mob was in a hall, used on Sundays for Swedenborgian worship; and in a town famous in that day for the manufacture of cotton gins, for southern trade, and so was an offering to slave-holding customers, as well as a tribute to religion and worship.

    Charles Lenox Remond earned a place in anti-slavery history worthy a monument, as well as extended biography. Salem, the place of his birth and residence during most of his life, never knew him, never will, to do any justice to his memory and worth. But he achieved a reputation, both in his own country and

    -481-


    (pp 482-495)

    for which we should be scarcely responsible in the least degree, might have preserved from many a discordant note that seemed to ring on down to the gates of the grave. It was not anger, it was not hate. It was rather the result of intensity of love. At least it was so among some of our very truest, bravest, best, whose natures could but love, could never hate.

    "Alas! they had been friends in youth!
    But whispering tongues can poison truth:
    And constancy lives in realms above:
    And life is thorny, and youth is vain:
    And to be wroth with those we love
    Doth work like madness in the brain."

    To the last, there were differences of opinion. On the question when to cease our operations as an anti-slavery organization, there was much earnest debate. Some contended that our distinctive work was not accomplished till the slave was made equal to the master at the ballot box, and in the government. And that this was all the more important since it was only by the slaves' valor on the battle-field, that the masters had been defeated and their rebellion suppressed.

    As my last printed speech was on that subject, at the last anti-slavery anniversary I attended, it may be pardonable to present it here, as showing somewhat the temper and spirit of the discussion, as well as the nature of the subject then in hand. It is, however, only pardonable because from the beginning it has been my constant care to be myself as little obtrusive as the nature of my work would warrant consistently with exact truth and right.

    The anniversary exercises were held in the church of the Puritans, whose walls had often shuddered with the truly terrible eloquence of Dr. Cheever, from Sunday to Sunday, in rebuke and denunciation of the southern oppressor and his not less guilty abettor

    -496-

    and accomplice in the north, in church and pulpit, as well as in the state. In the later years of the anti-slavery conflict, after he had been anathematized by the pulpit and almost driven from the pale of the church, only for his faithfulness to the cause of freedom and humanity, for his orthodoxy, as well as private virtues were high as heaven above suspicion, he seemed to speak as by permission and power of Him who "touched Isaiah's lips with hallowed fire," and to superadd at times all the terrors of Patmos as well. No other voice penetrated the dark, deep recesses of the pro-slavery church and pulpit, the American Bible, missionary and tract societies, as did his. For to his faith and virtue, he added a perfect knowledge of all their works and ways. My resolution at that last anniversary, read as below:
    Resolved, That the objects of the American anti-slavery society, as announced in its constitution and declaration of sentiment, are, "the entire abolition of slavery in the United States," and "the elevation of all persons of color, who possess the qualifications of others, to the enjoyment of the same privileges, and the exercise of the same prerogatives as others." And while we joyfully welcome, and will heartily co-operate with every new auxiliary in this vast field of action and effort, under whatever name, we can never lay down our own distinctive apostleship, until all those high purposes are fully accomplished."

    Though we had come to the last day and session of our meeting, I had not spoken before. We met at an early hour in the forenoon, and it was now nearly three in the afternoon, and we had not even taken a recess; but I ventured to obtrude myself at that unseasonable hour, and was heard with most respectful attention in the following remarks:

    -497-

    MR. PRESIDENT—This is the first time I have presumed on the attention of this convention, and now I know full well it is too late to ask to be heard. But it seems to me something might be said which has not yet found utterance, and I will not be long. I quite agree with our excellent friends who have said that this society has been four years virtually dead, though it seems to me a most humiliating confession to make. And I think, that although they insist that this is no time tor a funeral, still, if the society has been really four years dead, it is time it should be buried out of sight. It has certainly been inactive, though I trust it has only slept. And I have hoped that to-day a voice would be uttered that should be effective, saying, "Lazarus, come forth!"

    Four years ago it was announced on our platform that slavery was dead—that our anti-slavery efforts were no longer needed—that General Scott was now our general agent in place of Mr. May, and that the American army was now the American anti-slavery society. Well, that new anti-slavery society, under General Scott and others, prosecuted its conflict with such success and disaster as we now know. And the war dragged its slow length along, through nearly four dreary, desolating years. And slavery was still able to compete valiantly, if not successfully, with the mightiest armies that ever gathered in the field of bloody fight. For though we began with but seventy-five thousand, and they enrolled only for ninety days, before that period expired, we had summoned suddenly a half-million more, for a three years' service. And in less than four years, our army had reached the stupendous muster-roll of more than two and a half millions, and nearly the half-million had already "fought their last battle, slept their last sleep!"

    -498-

    Last month, we were wakened early one Monday morning, to celebrate what we presumed to be the complete triumph of our northern hosts and vanquishing of every southern foe. Richmond had surrendered, General Lee was our prisoner, and his forces with him, and we fancied that then, indeed, our work was done. There lay the monster slavery writhing in death agonies at our feet, his head not bruised only, but severed from his scaly form. And the whole free north burst into a joy unseen, unknown before since we were a nation. And that was a full week of jubilation. We thought the great red dragon was dead, our work done, and already reconstruction was under way. The president had made that last speech of his on the question, and the press of the country had given in its adhesion to his fatal [easy Reconstruction] doctrine.

    I well remember that on our Massachusetts Fast-day, our friend, Mr. Spaulding, of Salem, who addressed us so earnestly this morning, invited me to occupy his pulpit. And let me say for him, that although pastor of one of the largest churches in that state, he has been so faithful as to have driven what is known as "the copper-head element," pretty much out of his congregation, and dared still to invite me to give the fast-day discourse. So, occupying the desk, I presumed the prerogative of minister and selected a text from the scriptures, and spoke of the goodness and forbearance of God to the nation. The text was this, from the Hebrew prophets:

    "What could I have done for my vineyard that I have not done in it? Wherefore when I looked that it should bring forth grapes, brought it forth wild grapes?" [Isa. 5:4]

    In the course of remark, I referred to that speech of President Lincoln, and said it appeared to me highly proper that we observe a day of fasting and

    -499-

    prayer, for we had to treat with an evil spirit, which, though we fancied he was dead, and were celebrating our conquest and victory, was one that went not out after all, but by prayer and fasting. In the afternoon of that day, I went into the Salem Athenæum and read every daily newspaper of New York and Boston there, and every one, I think, with no exception endorsed its doctrine.

    I had a lecture in a neighboring town that evening, and went to it with a heavy heart; for I felt that it would be my duty to tell my audience that our joy was ill-timed, and would be vain; that our rejoicing, I was sure, would be turned into mourning. For in our very hour of triumph and of victory, as we thought, we were not doing justice; and were ready to reconstruct the government on the basis of white suffrage and citizenship, and that also disloyal; rejecting the bravery and loyalty that God had made the salvation of the country!

    I went to my lecture, you may be sure with heavy, desponding heart. I told my audience it seemed to me we were lost. I said: you have all called me "blue, blue-black, and bilious," and 1 know not what else, from the beginning of the war, but we are inevitably lost! For God has visited us in judgment; and in the last hour, when He seems to have left nothing undone that he could do for His vineyard, we still forget justice and judgment; none calling for justice, nor any in the high places of government pleading the cause of the poor, the very poorest of the poor!

    It was a sad meeting; well might it have been sad; it continued till a late hour in the evening; and a sadder audience, I never addressed, and a sadder heart in that joyous week, probably could not be found, than was mine. But in four and twenty hours from that time, God did appear,

    -500-

    and in most mysterious manner, and showed that there was at least one thing more possible to be done in his vineyard, that had not been done. The solemn, mourning drapery which darkens this temple to-day, answers the question of our text:
    "what more could have been done for my vineyard than I have done in it?" [Isa. 5:4]

    And so we closed our week of joy. I thought of the lines of Byron on Bonaparte, when he sung of his greatness and his fall:

    "O who would soar the solar height
    To set in such a starless night!"

    Abraham Lincoln

    Yes, Mr. President, that was a sad week for us. Our enemy was not slain; for while we exulted over his fall, and triumphed in what we presumed his everlasting discomfiture, the quivering monster gathered enough vitality to swing around his envenomed tail, and in an instant to sting our almost idolized chief magistrate [Abraham Lincoln] to death, before our very eyes!

    I felt then, that there was more work for me to do; and I have felt all through this meeting, that there was more work yet to be done by this grand old anti-slavery society, and I thought if we were indeed to cease from our good old apostleship, and our association was to be sacrificed here, it was fitting and well that we had this funeral drapery hanging here about us. But it seems to me that such a deed as our disbandment and dissolution would better become Ford's theatre than "the church of the Puritans," crape-darkened as it is for the dreadful tragedy which long yet must the nation mourn!

    No, Mr. Chairman, no; our work is not yet quite done; at least mine is not done, nor will it be done till the blackest man has every right which I, myself enjoy. I cannot prove that I love my neighbor as

    -501-

    myself till he stand by my side.

    And I honor my friend, Senator Wilson, for standing here to-day, and asserting it as his life purpose, to labor in private and in public, for the accomplishment of that glorious end.

    And I dare tell you my friends, that when slavery is abolished, we shall all know it, for it will be as though "Death and Hell gave up the ghost!"

    When we comprehend the malignity, yea, the "uncommon wrath" of the fell [evil] demon we have to face and overcome, and the terrible power and tenacity of life he has acquired, we shall all realize that our warfare is no pastime, no children's play; and that however freedmen's aid societies, and Christian associations may operate in their fields, they will every one of them, need the old polar star to guide them in their new, untried and dangerous way.

    Charity of readers may be trusted to forgive the egotism of inserting this address, in part for its sad historical reminiscences, but more especially for the other reasons already intimated. In methods and measures, abolitionists, even of clearest vision, spiritual as well as mental, could not always see eye to eye; though ready to live and die in defense of their common cause. But let the temper and spirit which breathe in this utterance, remarkable only that it was my last on our great subject ever given to the public through the press; let this witness, that even in our differings, we were still in heart and spirit friends in all which that divine word can be made to mean.

    And now this work is done. Would, that it could be as truthfully said, "well done." But nearly three score and fourteen, is too late in life to be engaged in such a service; especially when it is remembered that authorship has been no part of all my public labors of three and forty years.

    -502-

    Truth in statement, justice and right towards all persons and parties interested in any way in these chronicles, have been constantly, carefully, kept in view, alike towards foe and friend. In soul, spirit, purpose, I have known no foes; no sun has risen nor gone down on any wrath of mine.

    Most of my early comrades in the field-service, have gone, some of them long since gone to their well earned rest and reward. It is mine yet to live and guard watchfully their graves, and with tenderest affection to cherish their memory, and to shield it from any unjust reproach to the full extent of my power and to my latest breath.

    Of the great west and my many dear ones there living, or dead, I have scarcely spoken. And yet, nearly twenty of my autumns, and several winters were spent in most laborious service in the western states; and many there became not only faithful co-workers, but life-long and devoted friends. A volume much larger than this and greatly better every way would not suffice to do any justice to their exalted worth. But I live in unshaken faith and expectation of a glorious re-union awaiting us all.

    Nor with my present vision, could I desire sublimer felicity in such re-union, than to become more and more divinely endowed with celestial wisdom, knowledge and power; and then, in the same spirit of love and good will to men, to all men, appealing ever only to the highest, divinest elements in the human nature, to continue our work and service till the whole race shall be restored and redeemed, and sin and death, the last great and only real enemies, shall together give up the ghost.






    [The End]





    -503-



    Pillsbury in Later Life


    Memorial


    [In interim, pending completion of this site,
    you can obtain this book via your local library.]

    For Information on Pillsbury's Papers

    The UK ARM Site
    Overview
    Bishop S. Horsley's 1806 Anti-
    Slavery Bible Principles Speech

    Rev. B. Green's 1836
    Things for Northern Men to Do

    Rev. T. Weld's
    Bible Against Slavery
    (1837)
    Rev. T. Weld's
    Slavery Conditions
    (1839)
    Roman Catholic Church
    Opposition to Slavery

    A. Stewart's Unconstitutionality
    of Slavery
    (1845)
    L. Spooner's Unconstitutionality
    of Slavery
    (1845)
    B. Shaw's Unconstitutionality
    of Slavery
    (1846)
    Rev. Wm. Patton's Pro-slavery
    Interpretations of the Bible:
    Productive of Infidelity
    (1846)
    Rev. J. Fee's
    Anti-Slavery Manual
    (1851)
    H. Stowe's Key,
    Biblical Law Section
    (1853)
    Charles Darwin's
    Origin of Species
    (1857)
    Rev. G. Cheever's
    God Against Slavery
    (1857)
    Sen. C. Sumner's
    Barbarism of Slavery
    (1860)
    Stephen A. Hodgman, Chaplain of the 74th US Colored Infantry, The Nation's Sin and Punishment; or, The Hand of God Visible in the Overthrow of Slavery (1864)
    Homepage

    See also the biography, Parker Pillsbury: Radical Abolitionist, Male Feminist, by Prof. Stacey M. Robertson (Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 2000, based on her Ph.D. dissertation, Parker Pillsbury, Antislavery Apostle: Gender and Religion in Nineteenth-Century U.S. Radicalism (Santa Barbara: University of California, 1994). [At Amazon].

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