ffers a punishment to fall on a
man, or a race of men, he has a good and sufficient reason for it. If
He hides his face, or withhold his blessings, we may search for the
cause in our own hearts. "It is your iniquities," (said the prophet),
"that have separated you and your God." But to return to the
sovereignty of God. He has the power.--He has the right. He, alone, is
competent to decide what is best for us. "Hath not the potter power
over the same lump of clay, to make one vessel to honor, and another
to dishonor." He is under no obligation to any one; the best of us
having forfeited all right, title, or claim to his mercy. Whatever
mercies or blessings we may receive at the hands of Divine
Benificence, are unmerited; undeserved on our part. The Divine Being
is debtor to no one. There is no merit on our part, there can be none.
God nevertheless has respect to character. Shem and Japheth, acted in
accordance with Divine will, and He chose to confer on them certain
favors and benefits. Ham incurred his displeasure, by violating his
laws; and He left his posterity to those temporal misfortunes, which
must necessarily grow out of moral infirmities, and mental
disabilities.

I think I have clearly shown that African slavery originated in the
inferiority of the African race; and that the inferiority of the
African race, originated in the violation of God's laws. Slavery is
perpetuated by the cause that brought it into existence. I have
alluded in the preceding pages to the mental disabilities and the
moral defects and infirmities of the posterity of Ham; as subjecting
them to degradation and slavery. Physical conformation and color,
viz., the curly hair, the black skin, the flat nose, the broad flat
foot, &c., have had no small share in subjecting the negro race to
degradation and slavery. All other races of men shun and despise them
on account of their physical peculiarities. This is the key to that
universal prejudice against the African race, the world over. The
negro race are then, slaves from necessity, viz., they are slaves
because they are incapable of attaining to the rights and privilege of
free men. And those rights and privileges they never can enjoy in the
midst of the Anglo-Saxon race.

We have seen in the preceding pages, that slavery and all the evils
and calamities appertaining thereto, were entailed on Ham's posterity,
as a penalty for the wilful violation of God's laws; and, I shall
attempt to show befo