doctrine, developed out of the fundamental fact
that persons are not chattels; but it is to me wonderful that it
should be needful to prove to any one, that this is _not_ the doctrine
of the New Testament. Paul and Peter deliver excellent charges to
masters in regard to the treatment of their slaves, but without any
hint to them that there is an injustice in claiming them as slaves at
all. That slavery, _as a system_, is essentially immoral, no Christian
of those days seems to have suspected. Yet it existed in its
worst forms under Rome. Whole gangs of slaves were mere tools of
capitalists, and were numbered like cattle, with no moral relationship
to the owner; young women of beautiful person were sold as articles
of voluptuousness. Of course every such fact was looked upon by
Christians as hateful and dreadful; yet, I say, it did not lead them
to that moral condemnation of slavery, _as such_, which has won the
most signal victory in modern times, and is destined, I trust, to win
one far greater.

A friendly reviewer replies to this, that the apathy of the early
Christians to the intrinsic iniquity of the slave system rose out of
"their expectation of an immediate close of this world's affairs. The
only reason why Paul sanctioned contentment with his condition in the
converted slave, was, that for so short a time it was not worth while
for any man to change his state." I agree to this; but it does not
alter my fact: on the contrary, it confirms what I say,--that the
Biblical morality is not final truth. To account for an error surely
is not to deny it.

Another writer has said on the above: "Let me suppose you animated to
go as missionary to the East to preach this (Mr. Newman's) spiritual
system: would you, in addition to all this, publicly denounce the
social and political evils under which the nations groan? If so, your
spiritual projects would soon be perfectly understood, and _summarily
dealt with_.--It is vain to say, that, if commissioned by Heaven,
and endowed with power of working miracles, you would do so; for you
cannot tell under what limitations your commission would be given:
it is pretty certain, that _it would leave you to work a moral and
spiritual system by moral and spiritual means_, and not allow you to
turn the world upside down, and _mendaciously_ tell it that you came
only to preach peace, while every syllable you uttered would be an
incentive to sedition."--_Eclipse of Faith_, p. 419.

This