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Table of Contents:
Lecture
VI
: the abstract principle of slavery discussed on
Scripture grounds
, and misrepresentations of the principle examined.
[137]
Do unto another whatsoever you would have a right to require another to do unto you, if you were in his circumstances.
Now if we could suppose that the Saviour intended his language to be understood in the first sense, it will not perhaps be disputed that it is our duty to abolish domestic slavery, for we should, no doubt, desire to be released, if we were in a state of domestic slavery.
But, unfortunately for the argument, this interpretation would not stop at the abolition of domestic slavery in the case of the African.
It would reach to the domestic slavery of the child also.
There is scarcely a wayward lad in Christendom who could not justly claim release from parental restraint on the same principle!
Nay, more, the criminal at the bar of civil justice, the inmates of State prisons, and the poor man in his hovel, would all claim release!
And as that which is duty in others, in such cases, is a right in them, not to grant them release would certainly be a denial of their just rights!
Is this the sense in which Dr. Wayland would have us understand the Saviour of mankind?
Certain it is, that this is the only sense in which his words can be understood so as to involve the necessary abolition of slavery!
We cheerfully acquit Dr. W. from the purpose to teach any such agrarian folly.
Still, we can see no good reason why one
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