Year: 1864




country for having entailed upon us
so troublesome an incubus?


). Was not their failure to rid the
country OF the evil at the start. attrib-
utable alone to what they regarded as
the impracticability of the measure.
at the time then present? But, did
they not all unite in looking forward
to coming time when they both hoped
and expected it would be practicable
to do so?


1, And in view of this, did they not
most carefully guard the lam Cuage
OF the Constitution, so as to keep it
entirely free from any oord or phrase
which necessarily expressed the exis-
tence OF the institution amongst us?
W hen slaves were really referred to
did they not simply call them in the
Constitution, "perso"S hr!d 10 ~ernicc;"
but whether so held by virtue of sla-
very or by virtue Of a personal contract
agreed upon between the parties, the
Constitution saith not Who can fail
to see that this careful guarding Of the
wording OF that instrument was special
" designed so as to have its language
appropriate when the time should
come which they all hoped for, when
the institution should exist amongst
them no more.


Such, my hearers, was the anti-sla-
ver,ylsm o1 the fathers of our country


Now, what was thus true Of those
revolutionary times, continued to be
true through all the earlier years of
the Republic, and down until within q
score or so of years Of the present.


In confirmation of this | would ask,
did not Bishop Asbury, and anti sla-
very Methodist preachers (for we have
been strongly anti slavery from the
tirS) go, and continue to 90, South as
we'll as North, giving their voices con
tinualiy against this evil, both in their
private conversations, pulpit minis,ra-
tons, and printed testimony in our
book Of discipline, which, as Methodist
preachers are wont to do, they seat
tered broadcast, without let or hind
rance, throughout all the land? And
yet was not Bishop Asbury and those
Methodist preachers everywhere re-
ceived in the South up till l844-some
20 years ago? And received too, with
out protest, even welcomed lis messen-
gers Of God And had they not a
success, second to no other denOmina-
ZION, and that too amongst all classes
i'll all the South.


So high indeed, did Southern anti
sltvcryism run, not many years ago,
that several of their States very seri-
ously contemplated emancipation
And so late as 1892 Virginia., where
Southern blood is now being poured
out like water /or the institution, was
within one cote Of breaking every yoke
by her own law, and letting all her
oppressed go free.


But need | be more specific? Is
there any use that | should quote his
tory, with book and page, to convince
any here Of these things? Are they
not patent to every body?


When therefore, in opposition to
my position, it is claimed that during
all the yesrs of the past, until recently,
God was favorable to our land, not
withstanding the constant existence of
slavery amongst us; and that therefore,
it cannot be claimed by any ProViden-
tial indication, that he is averse TO the
institution, | reply that the reason of
such favor then, was. that though the
institution was amongst us, yet he saw
that IN Our he1rtS we We're averse to it,
and that III our purposes we contcmpla-
ted its final and total removal-and SO,
looking not ut the external appearance,
but looking at the nations heart and
intentions he pronounced us innocent,
and hence, blessed us.


Take an illustration Our Saviour
hates d. pravity, and yet, when in the
flesh, he took little depraved children
in his arms and blessed them. Now
why did he bless them, when he hated
their depravity. Why? Simply be-
cause they rad got their depravity
from their parents and couldn't get
clear Of it yet, and so he reckoned them
innocent, and bIest them.


Just SO, our forefathers plead before
God, before one another and before
the world, that though slavery was
them, it had come down to
them from the British, and that they
were not to blame, and that they could
not get rid of it yet Well, God knew
that all this was true, and so he &C
counted our young nation innocent,
and took it, also, up in his arms and
blessed it,


But, to continue the illustration,
suppose that such, at first, innocent
child lives; and that, when it comes to
years of maturity, instead of ridding
itself of its depravity, Gas it might do
through conversion) suppose that it
now tosters, and chertshes, and comes to
love its inherited depravity, and final
ly proclaims its intention to retain and