The weekly Mississippian. [volume] (Jackson, Miss.) 1859-1864, 1859-08-31

4
with the principles Of moral government o.
christian slavery which is the way that please
Christ
Our free agency comes naturally. In othel
words. the state of nature is free state
Children, for example. before they arrive a
years of accountability, are naturally free
In other words, moral government does moi
bind them. Hence being free naturally they
are thus prepared for moral government, tol
this kind of control, TO be virtuous, must be
voluntary. Hence being free naturally. and
so, free from moral government (and the re-
mark is as true of slave children as slavehold-
er's children) even. if they lie, or curse and
swear, steal or get drunk or murder they are
not blame worthy, and why Plainly be-
cause during the state of nature-the natural
ly free state, they are not morally bound
They do not come to be obliged agents-do
not come under moral government until they
arrive at that period when they are competent
to perceive the office and force of moral limita-
| tions OF their natural freedom.
For example, an infant slave during his state
of natural fberty-that is, before he comes
to be an Obliged agent-before he arrives at
the age of moral accountability or obligation
may with perfect moral IMMUNITY violate
the higher law of slavery-that is to say
may curse his master-may strike him-may
lie, steal, &C., &c, but when he passes from
the naturally free state, he passes into NOR
very or the legislation of Christ takes hold Of
him, and obliges him to obey those limitations
of his natural liberty, instituted by Christ as
the philosophy of his state. He then comes
to be obliged to do, not as he, but as his mas
ter, pleases, just as his master is obliged by
this same higher law of his state to act to-
wards him in accordance with the precepts of
the Scripture.
Hence both parties are naturally free, and
both come under moral or ethical limitations
of their natural liberty, at the same period
that is, when they arrive at years Of moral
obligation
Abolitionists think they succeed in the ar
gument as regards slavery, when they prove
that it interferes with the natural liberty of
the african race The proper method of meet
ing this argument is to define natural liberty,
and contrast it with moral government and
show that all moral rule is a necessary and
unavoidable interference with, and limitation
Of. mans original or natural free agency. 1t
is quite obvious that the very moment you be-
gin to set limits to conduct or human action,
you proceed to circumscribe and eurtail con-
duct, previously not limited or curtailed con-
duct not eurtailed or limited is free-conduct
limited to the use Of prescribed rules, is res
tricted or obliged, or obliged to act within, OF
in obedience Of the limiting or curtailing
rules.
Now, the object of civil rule is to tread in
the footsteps of the higher law as Ear as con-
duces to the public welfare in the opinion of
finite and imperfect intelligences
What is moral obligation? 1t is simply
the duty to do something, e. e,) to obey some
rule, which the obligee is free to disobey. If
any agent is unable to disobey rule Of con-
duct, there is obviously no morality in ODE
dience, for obedience is then necessary. 1t is
for this cardinal reason, that contend that
men have the natural liberty to obey or DISC
hey rules of moral conduct
Now, when God instituted moral govern
ment, he knew that his creature had his natu- |
raj powers in full exercise, and was free to use |
them as he saw proper, until limited or obliged /
ethically or theoretically merely not to use
them in the performance of certain prohibited
actions.
But letus return to the character of moral
evil
No rational man can deny the existence of
both moral and physical evil in the creations |
of God. Why is moral evil to be found in the |
institutions of God The answer is as plain, |
as the fact is obvious. 1t is merely because |
God is the only morally perfect being or exis-
tence. Now, anything not morally perfect is
less than morally perfect, and anything moral
ly imperfect is necessarily morally evil to the
precise extent of the imperfection. Mark
you, if you please, that moral and physical
evils are the only things that can make the
finite less than the infinite or the perfect
The very moment, therefore, that you begin
to say that it is an objection to things or in
situations in time, that they are morally or
physically evil, that very moment do you con-
denim the Supreme Being for moving in Gre
atoms at all, for it is obvious to the plainest
capacity, that he is necessitated either to Gre
ate the perfect-the infinite the certain
which would be to create a God Of infinite
PROJECTIONS in wisdom, goodness and power,
like himself thing that is utterly incon
ceivable and repugnant to human reason; or
as he has done, to create the limited, the I'M
perfect, the relative, the uncertain, the finite,
the morally and physically evil
Even if slayery.were the very best institu-
ton that God or Angels ever contemplated
which L is the merest folly to suppose, still
it would be morally imperfect or evil to the
extent of its inferiority to the perfect exis-
tence of the creator of it.
To say, therefore, as | unhesitatingiy do
that slavery is morally evil, is simply to say
that as an existence it is inferior to the God
that caused it to exist. as sacred state, infe-
nor in the several perfections Of wisdom, power,
and goodness. To say that it is not morally
imperfect is intrinsically and truly an act of
idolatry, for it is affirming of the created-the
instituted, what is only true of the uncreated
and the uninstituted God is the only ilpcre-
ated and uninstituted existence, and therefore
the only one exempt from moral imperfection
or evil
If now you turn upon me and tell me that
moral evil is equivalent to sin, then | say to
you that you make God the cause of SHINING
which were to destroy the whole scheme OF
moral agency, human virtue, responsibility,
&c. No, no. Shining is the act of the finite
creature-moral evil the less than the morally
perfect.
The whole question with respect to the ex-
istence of moral evil, turns upon its ultimate
purpose. lake uTuuhcHucoc, toA S1"AA,t'-S'
What Interior benevolent purpose, could God,
by possibility, have in view when ne institute
ed the drunken state, or rather, when he made
II possible for his creatures to be drunken =
Evidently and manifestiy that there might be
virtue in Temperance. If man could not
be drunken, how in the name OF common
sense could be be either praised or blamed Tor
not doing what he could not Unless my
Creator, in creation, had made it possible for
me to be drunk, how could | manifest my in
tegrity by voluntary obedience-by refusing
to be drunken in other words, by living
life of voluntary obedience of the great law OF
temperance Choice implies an alternative
and requires it.
Moral evil is imperfect goodness-phys
evil IS natural imperfection.
Paley has treated the question of physical
evil, and has affirmed that this evil of the nat
ural world is not the predominant design of
the Creator, as displayed in his works. But
in this he is entirely IN error.
n