SECTION VI.

Is it the duty of American slaveholders to liberate their slaves? I feel no hesitancy in replying to this interrogatory. It would be their duty, as Christians, to liberate their slaves, provided the condition of the slave would be improved thereby; otherwise it is their duty to retain them in bondage, and make that provision for them which their circumstances require. They should make ample provision for their physical wants--enlighten their minds; and so far as is practicable under existing circumstances, they should elevate their characters above that debasement and degradation, in which, ignorance, prejudice and vice has involved them. It is clearly the duty of slaveholders to place their slaves in that condition, which will conduce most to their happiness here and hereafter. But if this is their object, they could not, as a general rule, take a worse step, than to liberate them in their present condition and turn them loose among us. Nor do I consider the mass of the negro population in this country as yet prepared for colonization: but I would rejoice to see all well-disposed and intelligent negroes manumitted and colonized.

The poverty, vice and degradation of free negroes is notorious, throughout the length and breadth of this country--North and South; but having so frequently alluded to it, I deem it unnecessary to say more on the subject. I will however remark, that if the entire African population were manumitted and turned loose among us; they would be forced to subsist almost entirely by theft, and all the county jails and state prisons in the Union, would not contain one in a hundred of the convicts. The fact is, such would be their depredations on the white population, that the whites would shoot them down with as little ceremony as they now shoot a mad dog; and their ultimate extermination would be the inevitable consequence! I appeal to facts. It was stated a few years ago by an able writer; that in Massachusetts the free negroes were 1 to 74, viz., there were 74 white persons for every free negro in the State; and yet one-sixth of all the convicts were free negroes. That in Connecticut the free negroes were 1 to 34; and that one-third of the convicts were free negroes. That in New York the free negroes were 1 to 35; but that one-fourth of the convicts were free negroes. That in New Jersey the free negroes were 1 to 13; negro convicts one-third. That in Pennsylvania the free negroes were 1 to 34, and that one-third of the convicts were free negroes. He moreover stated, that one-fourth of the whole expense connected with the prison system of the entire North was incurred by crime committed by free negroes; and that the same was true with regard to the pauper expenditures of the entire North. In view of these facts, we can feel but little surprise, that Indiana and Illinois have enacted laws to interdict the immigration of free negroes into those States.

It appears from the above named States, that in 1845, about one-fortieth of the entire population in the free States were colored persons; and yet about one-fourth of the convicts were free negroes; but notwithstanding that the colored and the white population are very nearly balanced in the slave States, I do not suppose that one in a hundred of the convicts are negroes! But there is another fact with regard to free negroes North, that is still more remarkable! Few, comparatively, very few, are members of any branch of the church--probably not one in twenty of the entire adult population. But, on the contrary, in the slave States, I think it probable that at least three-fourths of the entire adult slave population are church members; and I presume, that near one-half of the African professors of the Christian religion, in the slave States, are attached to the Methodist Episcopal Church South; and strange as it may appear, it is nevertheless true, that in the very hot-bed of abolitionism, viz., in the extensive territory of New England, Providence, Maine, Vermont and New Hampshire Conferences, there was not a solitary free negro in connection with the Methodist Episcopal Church! Is not this a remarkable fact? Here, we have a territory of vast extent; embracing something more than a half dozen states, and containing within its limits multiplied thousands of free negroes; and not one! No! not a solitary free negro is found in the bosom of the Methodist Episcopal Church! Many of them left pious and humane masters in the South, and were withal pious themselves when they left their masters; or, otherwise, they were stolen from good men in the South by pseudo Christians of the North, and taken to that free and happy land! the land of their dear friends, and consigned to poverty, vice, degradation and the devil!!!

What does all this mean? How does it happen that the free blacks of the North are so little benefitted by the Christian ministry--particularly in those sections where a large portion of the ministers belong to the abolition faction? How does it happen that the African population are so little benefitted or influenced by them? Is it true, that the negroes have discernment enough to see, that their wordy benefactors have done nothing for either their souls or their bodies--that conscience and religious principle have but little to do with all this slavery agitation? It must be so! Hence, we can understand why it is, that the African population have more confidence in a slaveholding ministry in the South, than they have in an abolition ministry in the North.

My engagements are such, that I shall be forced for the present to pass over the argument mainly relied on by abolitionists of every grade, to prove the sinfulness of American slavery; or at least, I can give it but a cursory notice. I understand that a celebrated D.D., has published a work, in which, he labors hard to prove the sinfulness of American slavery from its evils. It was the design of the author of Uncle Tom's Cabin, to prove the sinfulness of slavery from its evils; or otherwise, its abuses. If this mode of reasoning is allowable in one case, it is so in another, and by this mode of reasoning I can prove the sinfulness of every institution beneath the sun, social, civil and religions. It is in fact the argument principally relied on by skeptics to invalidate the Christian religion. They will all point to its abuses, or in other words, to the evils growing out of its abuses. Every institution, social, civil and religious is subject to abuse--may be prostituted to the worst of purposes--the institution of Christianity not excepted. But it does not necessarily follow, because an institution is subject to abuse--because it is prostituted to vile purposes, that there is any thing wrong about the institution. The evil consists in the abuse or improper use, and not in the institution. Cupidity inhumanity, and the gratification of the animal passions and propensities, have incited slaveholders to the worst of crimes. But this does not prove that the holding of slaves is sinful, per se, under all circumstances. I have shown in the last chapter of this work, (Chap 13,) that men are too often prompted from selfish motives to attach themselves to churches, and that many of them are prostituting a Christian profession to the worst of purposes. But this does not prove that there is anything defective or wrong about the Christian religion. No, by no means. If clergymen descend from their sacred vocation to dabble with politics, and a thousand other things that a minister of Christ should not touch; or to use their ministerial influence to accomplish the most diabolical purposes, and thereby bring reproach on the Christian name, and a grievous curse on the nation--then assuredly, the institution of Christianity is not to blame for it; for its Author, both by precept and example taught the contrary. It was but a few days ago, that a skeptic remarked to me, "that the inconsistent conduct of professors of religion satisfied him that there was no truth in the Bible; or at all events, that there was something wrong about it." I must hasten to a close, as I cannot extend my remarks on this subject.

There now lies before me a paper, containing the following remarks: "There is, however, one admitted feature in American slavery of a character so shameful as to justify almost anything that can be said or imagined of the institution. Men live with their female slaves in a state of concubinage, beget children, raise them in their families with a perfect knowledge of their origin, and sell them or leave them to be sold by others in case of decease or reverses." It is strange that those who indulge in such opprobrious remarks about southern slaveholders, do not look after their own white bastards which are scattered over this entire country, east, west, north and south. Men are everywhere, (with a few exceptions,) the world over, utterly devoid of all parental affections for their illegitimate children; and the Southern man, no doubt, has fully as much concern about his mulatto bastards as the Northern man has about his white bastards. What is the Southern man to do with his brood of mulatto children? Suppose he liberates them, their condition is but little improved thereby, unless he sends them out of the country. It is, however, clearly his duty to educate and manumit such children; but what is the duty of the Northern man surrounded by a score of his illegitimate progeny? The condition of the children of the white concubines of the North are not a whit better, than that of the colored concubines of the South; and the Northern man who suffers his children to become the victims of poverty and vice--to sink into the very lowest depths of degradation!--hopelessly, irretrievably lost, is no better than the Southern man who suffers his mulatto children to be sold. One thing is clear; the Northerner can do much more to ameliorate the condition of his unfortunate offspring than the Southerner; and for this reason, he is probably the worst man of the two.