their RIGHT to their
slaves, always assume their own right to themselves. What slave-holder
ever undertook to prove his right to himself? He knows it to be a
self-evident proposition, that _a man belongs to himself_--that the
right is intrinsic and absolute. In making out his own title, he makes
out the title of every human being. As the fact of being _a man_ is
itself the title, the whole human family have one common title deed. If
one man's title is valid, all are valid. If one is worthless, all are.
To deny the validity of the _slave's_ title is to deny the validity of
_his own_; and yet in the act of making a man a slave, the slaveholder
_asserts_ the validity of his own title, while he seizes him as his
property who has the _same_ title. Further, in making him a slave, he
does not merely disfranchise of humanity _one_ individual, but UNIVERSAL
MAN. He destroys the foundations. He annihilates _all rights_. He
attacks not only the human race, but _universal being_, and rushes upon
JEHOVAH. For rights are _rights_; God's are no more--man's are no less.

The eighth commandment forbids the taking of _any part_ of that which
belongs to another. Slavery takes the _whole_. Does the same Bible which
prohibits the taking of _any_ thing from him, sanction the taking of
_every_ thing! Does it thunder wrath against the man who robs his
neighbor of a _cent_, yet commission him to rob his neighbour of
_himself?_ Slaveholding is the highest possible violation of the eight
commandment. To take from a man his earnings, is theft. But to take the
_earner_, is a compound, life-long theft--supreme robbery that vaults up
the climax at a leap--the dread, terrific, giant robbery, that towers
among other robberies a solitary horror. The eight commandment forbids
the taking away, and the tenth adds, "Thou shalt not _covet_ any thing
that is thy neighbor's;" thus guarding every man's right to himself and
property, by making not only the actual taking away a sin, but even that
state of mind which would _tempt_ to it. Who ever made human beings
slaves, without _coveting_ them? Why take from them their time, labor,
liberty, right of self-preservation and improvement, their right to
acquire property, to worship according to conscience, to search the
Scriptures, to live with their families, and their right to their own
bodies, if they do not _desire_ them? They COVET them for purposes of
gain, convenience, lust of dominion, of sensual gratificati