rom that which
pervades the speeches of the honorable Senator, as the pure charity of
Heaven is from the dire malignity of earth.

"It might be shown," says Mr. Sumner, "that the present epistle, when
truly interpreted, is a protest against slavery, and a voice for
freedom." If, instead of merely asserting that this "might be done," the
accomplished orator had actually done it, he would have achieved far
more for the cause of abolitionism than has been effected by all the
splendors of his showy rhetoric. He has, indeed, as we shall presently
see, made some attempt to show that the Epistle to Philemon is an
emancipation document. When we come to examine this most extraordinary
attempt, we shall perceive that Mr. Sumner's power "to pervert texts and
to invent authority," has not been wholly held in reserve for what
"might be done." If his view of this portion of Scripture be not very
profound, it certainly makes up in originality what it lacks in depth.
If it should fail to instruct, it will at least amuse the reader. It
shall be noticed in due time.

The next point that claims our attention is the intimation that St.
Paul's "real judgment of slavery" may be inferred "from his
condemnation, on another occasion, of 'manstealers,' or, according to
the original text, slave-traders, in company with murderers of fathers
and murderers of mothers." Were we disposed to enter into the exegesis
of the passage thus referred to, we might easily show that Mr. Sumner is
grossly at fault in his Greek. We might show that something far more
enormous than even trading in slaves is aimed at by the condemnation of
the apostle. But we have not undertaken to defend "manstealers," nor
"slave-traders," in any form or shape. Hence, we shall dismiss this
point with the opinion of Macknight, who thinks the persons thus
condemned in company with murderers of fathers and mothers, are "they
who make war for the inhuman purpose of selling the vanquished as
slaves, as is the practice of the African princes." To take any free
man, whether white or black, by force, and sell him into bondage, is
manstealing. To make war for such a purpose, were, we admit, wholesale
murder and manstealing combined. This view of the passage in question
agrees with that of the great abolitionist, Mr. Barnes, who holds that
"the _essential_ idea of the term" in question, "is _that of converting
a free man into a slave_" . . . . the "changing of a freeman into a slave,
especi