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[181] evident truths of human equality and rights,—and appealed to arms for its defence, it spoke of the new enterprise as one ‘without which that of our fathers is incomplete,’ and as transcending theirs in magnitude, solemnity, and probable results as much ‘as moral truth does physical force.’ It spoke of the difference of the two in the means and ends proposed, and of the trifling grievances of our fathers compared with the wrongs and sufferings of the slaves, which it forcibly characterized as unequalled by any others on the face of the earth. It claimed that the nation was bound to repent at once, to let the oppressed go free, and to admit them to all the rights and privileges of others; because, it asserted, no man has a right to enslave or imbrute his brother; because liberty is inalienable; because there is no difference, in principle, between slave-holding and man-stealing, which the law brands as piracy; and because no length of bondage can invalidate man's claim to himself, or render slave laws anything but ‘an audacious usurpation.’ It maintained that no compensation should be given to planters emancipating slaves, because that would be a surrender of fundamental principles; ‘slavery is a crime, and is, therefore, not an article to be sold;’ because slave-holders are not just proprietors of what they claim; because emancipation would destroy only nominal, not real property; and because compensation, if given at all, should be given to the slaves. It declared any ‘scheme of expatriation’ to be ‘delusive, cruel, and dangerous.’ It fully recognized
Boston and New York, Houghton, Mifflin and company, 1888-89.
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