d against polygamy; the
Apostles have never written nor preached to us against slavery, but on
the contrary here is the Apostle to the Gentiles sending back a servant
escaped from his master; and in that letter on the pastor's table he
enjoins duties on masters and slaves. I have confidence that my brother
will not again class slavery with polygamy, for it would be a reflection
upon divine wisdom and justice.

"'One thing more. My brother says slavery is the sum of all villanies.

"'But did not the Most High God place his people in slavery for seventy
years, in Babylon? This does not prove that slavery is a good thing, in
itself; for by the same proof heathenism might be shown to be a
blessing. Slavery was a curse, a punishment; but still, God would not
have made use of slavery to punish his people, if, theoretically and
practically, it is by necessity all which my brother alleges. It surely
did not, in that case, prove a "villany" to Babylon. They were the best
seventy years of their probationary state, when that people held the
Jews in captivity. Now I beg not to be misunderstood nor to have my
meaning perverted. I am not pleading for slavery. I simply say that God
would not have put his people, whom He had not cast off forever, into
slavery, if slavery, _per se_, were the sum of all villanies, or, if the
practical effect of it on them would be, necessarily, destruction, or
inconsistent with his purposes of benevolence. I will add, that every
people and every man, who hold others in bondage, should be admonished
that when God puts his captives, his bondmen, into their hands, He is
most jealous of the manner in which the trust is discharged. I do think,
I say it here with all possible emphasis, it is the most delicate, the
most solemn, the most awful responsibility, to stand in the relation of
master to a bondman.

* * * * *

"No further discussion was had at that time, the hour being late, and so
the meeting was closed with prayer and singing. Masters and servants
joined to chant a hymn, of which the following, written many years after
by Gregory of Nazianzum, might almost seem to be the expansion:--

"'Christ, my Lord, I come to bless Thee,
Now when day is veiled in night,
Thou who knowest no beginning,
Light of the eternal light.

"'Thou hast set the radiant heavens,
With thy many lamps of brightness,
Filling all the vaults above;
Day and night in turn