“ Disinterested benevolence, my dear sir, has nothing at all to do with abolitionism. Nay, I doubt very much if there is such a thing as disinterested benevolence; but be this as it may, there is no occasion for it in the anti-slavery ranks.
It is selfishness,—sheer selfishness, that has thus far carried on the war with slavery and wrong in all times; and selfishness must break the chains of the American slave.
Self-love has fixed the chain around the arm of every leader and every soldier in the American anti-slavery army. ”

“ No one is allowed to fetch him the blessings of education, and no preacher of righteousness is suffered to illumine his dark mind by the presentation of sacred truth.
It is indeed true that slavery is a political, a civil, and a commercial evil. It is true that it is most excruciating and frightful in its effects upon the physical nature of its victim. But slavery is seen in its more awful wickedness and terrible heinousness, when we contemplate the vast waste of intellect, the vast waste of moral and spiritual energy, which has been caused by its poisonous touch. ”

“ To include in the idea of piracy, that also of robbery and murder, is to confound two things entirely distinct, and which really have no sort of connection. If I take from another that which I have no right to by the laws of the society or government under which I live, then I am a robber; for that alone is property which the law makes property, as one of your own great statesmen has very properly said; and if I take life, when not essential to maintain my own rights under the laws of that government which I recognize in my social obligations, I am a murderer. ”

“ If Liberty were to go on a pilgrimage all over the earth, she would find a home in every house, and a welcome in every heart. None would reject the favors she offers if brought to their own doors. Sure and prompt as the impulses of instinct, every bosom would open to admit her and her blessings, but—when her gospel is proclaimed as a common bounty to all the world,—when she is seen visiting and feasting with publicans and sinners, and sitting with her unwashed disciples in familiar and loving companionship, Cæsar and the synagogue are alike alarmed and enraged. ”

“ I now so read that good book, that I discriminate between the erroneous ideas and practices of the Jews and the divine law—between historical facts and traditional inferences—between man's misconceptions and the true principles of religion. I now can and do see from the Bible itself that slavery is all wrong; and being so, I am obliged to be an Abolitionist; for I know that no Christian ought to continue the practice of what is wrong in itself on any consideration. But, Albert, how was it that you who did not believe in the Bible, became an Abolitionist? ”

“ What is called the abuse here is the essence and the characteristic of the subject. Service as well as slavery may be abused. Everything may be abused. But, the claim of the slaveholder is itself the abuse of the God-ordained relation of master and servant. Can men be regarded as a chattel?—that is the question—and so regarded without his consent, and his family treated as such permanently, without his consent, or even with it?
It comes of this bad interpretation of the Christian law, that in the nineteenth century slavery still remains,—is cherished. ”

“ Surely you do not believe that the Scriptures justify such a life."
"That is precisely my belief, Miss," replied the Captain. "Piracy is a Bible institution, and if it were not so, I would abandon it at once."
"Ah!" said Albert, "that accounts for it. It is that belief in the Bible that leads the mind and the heart astray from the clear principles of a sound moral philosophy. Even my good Mary, here, is so warped by her reverence for the Bible, that she defends the institution of slavery, which I abhor with all my heart. ”

“ Wealthy and influential gentlemen in our commercial cities, out of compliment to southern electors, became amateur huntsmen, and in New York and Boston the chase was pursued with all the zeal and apparent delight that could have been expected in Guinea or Virginia. Slave-catching was the test, at once, of patriotism and gentility, while sympathy for the wretched fugitive was the mark of vulgar fanaticism. The north was humbled in the dust, by the action of her own recreant sons. Every "good citizen" found himself, for the first time in the history of mankind, a slave-catcher by law. ”

“ In the sacred name of Jesus we beg for mercy, and the slave-whip, red with blood, cracks over us in mockery. We invoke the aid of the ministers of Him who came "to preach deliverance to the captive," and to set at liberty them that are bound, and from the loftiest summits of this ministry comes the inhuman and blasphemous response, saying: if one prayer would move the Almighty arm in mercy to break your galling chains, that prayer would be withheld. We cry for help to humanity—a common humanity, and here too we are repulsed. ”

“ Abolitionists ought to consider it a legitimate part of their great work, to aid in such an enterprise—to abolish not only chattel servitude, but that other kind of slavery, which, for generation after generation, dooms an oppressed people to a condition of dependence and pauperism. Such an Institution would be a shining mark, in even this enlightened age; and every man and woman, equipped by its discipline to do good battle in the arena of active life, would be, next to the emancipated bondman, the most desirable "Autograph for Freedom." ”

“ Mr. F. Do you mean to say, Rebecca, that slaveholding has the same effect upon me that stage-playing has upon the actor?
Mrs. G. Well, brother, I put it to thy own conscience. Does thee not, daily, in dealing with thy slaves, stifle thy emotions of piety, generosity, and love, and is it not easier to do this now than it was twenty years ago, when, with a heart full of tenderness and truth, thee left us for thy southern home?
Mr. F. (Rising and pacing the room with great agitation.) Now, sister, you are going to introduce another absurdity! Do I practice the principles learned in the nursery? ”

“ We may if we do not proscribe theft, and bring the positive law of God to bear against it, and bring a law into harmony with the divine, be understood, while we talk only of the abuses of property, as warning rather against spending stolen goods in a bad way, than against theft itself? But the design of the moral law is to define rights, as well as to govern the use of them; and it requires that not only the tempers of men, but the institutions of society, be adjusted by the law of equity and charity. ”

“ If there had been no such common Humanity, then the dark and massive Egyptian obelisk would not have everywhere reappeared in the sepulchral architecture of our own times, and the light and graceful orders of Greece and Italy would not as now have been the models of our villas and our dwellings, nor would the simple and lofty arch and the delicate tracery of Gothic design have been as it now is, everywhere consecrated to the service of religion. ”

“ Have not all men consciousness of a property in the memory of human transactions available for the same great purposes, the security of their individual rights, and the perfection of their individual happiness? Have not all men a consciousness of the same equal interest in the achievements of invention, in the instructions of philosophy, and in the solaces of music and the arts? And do not these achievements, instructions, and solaces, exert everywhere the same influences, and produce the same emotions in the bosoms of all men? ”

“ It is a necessity of all great nations to hate meanness, and nothing under God's heaven ever was so mean as American slavery. Think of it. Men who swagger around with pistols and bowie-knifes to avenge their insulted honor, if any one should question it,—imagine one turning up his sleeves to horsewhip an old woman for burning his steak, or pocketing her wages, earned at the wash-tub! ”

“ Mind, Godlike, immortal mind, with its burden of deathless thought, its comprehensive and discriminating reason, its brilliant wit, its genial humor, its store-house of thrilling memories—a voice of mingled power and pathos, words burning with the unconsuming fire of genius, virtues gathering in ripened beauty upon a brave heart, and moral integrity preeminent over all else—all this could not make a black man the social equal of a white coxcomb, even though his brain were as blank as white paper, and his heart as black as darkness concentrated. ”

“ Since all men are seeking liberty and happiness for a season here, and to deserve and so to secure more perfect liberty and happiness somewhere in a future world, and, since they all substantially agree that these temporal and spiritual objects are to be attained only through the knowledge of truth and the practice of virtue, have not mankind practically one common pursuit through one common way of one common and equal hope and destiny? ”

“ Giddy as you may be with the descent you have made, delighted as you are with the pleasure afforded, with the elysium to which he has wafted you, you return too often dissatisfied with his and your own impetuosity and want of firmness. You feel that you had had only a dream, a pastime, not a reality.
This great power of momentary captivation consists in his eloquence of manner—his just appreciation of words. [Pg 167]
In listening to him, your whole soul is fired—every nerve strung—every passion inflated—every faculty you possess ready to perform at a moment's bidding. ”

“ In the evening we had quite a gathering of friends from the neighborhood—intelligent, sensible, earnest, people—who had grown up in the love of the anti-slavery cause as into religion. The subject of conversation was: "The duty of English people to free themselves from any participation in American slavery, by taking means to encourage the production of free cotton in the British provinces."
It is no more impossible or improbable that something effective may be done in this way, than that the slave-trade should have been abolished. Every great movement seems an impossibility at first. ”

“ But as time shall step between them and the future, none will be sought after with more enthusiasm or greater pleasure than that of Wilberforce. No man's philosophy was ever moulded in a nobler cast than his; it was founded in the school of Christianity, which was, that all men are by nature equal; that they are wisely and justly endowed by their Creator with certain rights which are irrefragable, and no matter how human pride and avarice may depress and debase, still God is the author of good to man; and of evil, man is the artificer to himself and to his species. ”

“ Permit me, then, to sign myself the friend of every effort for human emancipation in our own country, and throughout the world. God speed the day when all chains shall fall from the limbs and from the soul, and universal liberty co-exist with universal righteousness and universal peace. ”

“ Where would William Lloyd Garrison have been to-day, if any combination of circumstances could have shut in his soul's deep hatred of oppression, and prevented its finding utterance in burning words? [Pg 231] He would have been dead and rotten. It is necessary to his own existence that he should work,—work for the slave; and in his work he gratifies all the strongest instincts of his nature, more completely than even the grossest sensualist can gratify his, by unlimited indulgence. ”

“ Why, one of our generous southern planters is as far above one of your stingy shave-three-cents-on-a-yard-tradesmen, as Robin Hood is above a miserable tea-spoon burglar. The south sails under false colors, does it? What flag do your platform men give to the wind, I should like to know? What do they care for the Fugitive Slave Law? Half of them would help a runaway to Canada with as good a will as they'd eat their dinner. ”

“ You silly women are always talking about righteousness, as if you really thought it could enter in human plans, but we men of the world, who have to wring the precious dollar from the hard hand of labor, know better! I tell you, Rebecca, I don't believe there is a business-man in your pious Quaker city even, who would dare acquaint his wife and daughters with all his little arrangements for amassing wealth. Ha! ha! ha! How the pretty things would stare at the tricks of the trade, and simper: "Is that right?" As though anybody thought business principles were gospel principles! ”

“ Fine moral sense will pour indignation on oppression, as well as applause on worth. It will give sympathy to the afflicted, and treasures to relieve the needy. Such a spirit will exalt a nation, and command the respect of other nations. But general freedom can only flourish beneath the undisturbed dominion of equitable laws.
Governments should aim at the welfare of the people, and that government which secures the person, the property, the liberty, the lives of dutiful subjects, and thus makes the common good the rule and measure of its government, will receive a blessing from God. ”

“ Christ makes the Christian—the Christian in Christ and Christ in the Christian—a loving, affectionate, endearing union—of ignorance with wisdom, of infirmity with strength, of immorality with virtue. Christ throws his robe of righteousness over the follies and the wickedness of the converted soul, and by covering him with himself, gradually similates him to himself until what is carnal being cast off, the spiritual remains at death a pure child of God. ”

“ The great men of the nation, the mighty men, the chief priests and rulers, have risen in their strength, and resolved to crush, as with an avalanche, the irrepressible aspirations of the bondman's heart for freedom; they have attempted to padlock the out-gushing sympathies of humanity ”

“ The iniquity of our cherished institution is no longer a MYSTERY. All Christendom is now made familiar with it, and is sending forth a cry of indignant remonstrance and of taunting scorn. Such is the suppression of anti-slavery agitation given to the slaveholders by their northern friends—such the strength imparted by the fugitive slave law to the system of human bondage. ”

“ Friendship for the Slave is Friendship for the Master.
It is a mistake on the part of the people of the south to suppose that those who desire the extinction of slavery, whether residing in America or England, are actuated by unfriendly feelings toward them personally, or by any hostility to the pecuniary or social interests of their section of country. The most important and influential classes of the population, both of England and of the northern States of this Union, have a direct and strong pecuniary interest at stake, in the prosperity and welfare of the south. ”

“ Just so far as the true spirit of Jesus is infused into the soul, and acts in the life of man, we know that sin, in its various forms of sensuality, oppression, and bloodshed, must disappear. All reforms, which are not based on this corner-stone, are superficial; and, however goodly their proportions may appear to the eye of man, they want that firm foundation which will secure them against being undermined or overthrown by the force of adverse circumstances. "Other foundation can no man lay, than that is laid," for the building up of all that is really excellent and heavenly. ”

“ Clair, being a Christian, will feel the force of such high authority."
"Truly, Mr. Gracelius," said Mary, "I do take the Bible as my highest standard of truth; and it is from the principles taught by the Bible that I have the assurance that piracy is awfully criminal. And I am utterly astonished that a man of your apparent piety, and who so well understands the doctrines of Christianity, can for a moment think that the Bible justifies such crimes."
"My dear young sister," said the minister, "you are begging the question when you call piracy a crime, for that is the very thing you are to prove. ”