faithfully in the light of the times. And they are reading it more and
more in harmony with the views which have been reached by the highest
Southern minds, to wit:--That the relation of master and slave is
sanctioned by the Bible;--that it is a relation belonging to the same
category as those of husband and wife, parent and child, master and
apprentice, master and hireling;--that the relations of husband and wife,
parent and child, _were ordained in Eden for man, as man_, and _modified
after the fall_, while the relation of slavery, as a system of labor, is
_only one form of the government ordained of God over fallen and degraded
man_;--that the _evils_ in the system are _the same evils_ of OPPRESSION
we see in the relation of husband and wife, and all other forms of
government;--that slavery, as a relation, suited to the more degraded or
the more ignorant and helpless types of a sunken humanity, is, like all
government, intended _as the proof of the curse of such degradation, and
at the same time to elevate and bless_;--that the relation of husband and
wife, being for man, as man, _will ever be over him_, while slavery will
remain so long as God sees it best, as a controlling power over the
ignorant, the more degraded and helpless;--and that, when he sees it for
the good of the country, he will cause it to pass away, if the slave can
be elevated to liberty and equality, political and social, with his
master, _in_ that country; or _out of_ that country, if such elevation
cannot be given therein, but may be realized in some other land: all which
result must be left to the unfoldings of the divine will, _in harmony with
the Bible_, and not to a newly-discovered dispensation. These facts are
vindicated in the Bible and Providence. In the Old Testament, they stare
you in the face:--in the family of Abraham,--in his slaves, bought with
his money and born in his house,--in Hagar, running away under her
mistress's hard dealing with her, and yet sent back, as a fugitive slave,
by the angel,--in the law which authorized the Hebrews to hold their
brethren as slaves for a time,--in which parents might sell their children