accountability
for all the gold of Ophir!

But it is not all the clergymen of this part of the country, nor the
most of them, nor the half of them, who have turned Constitutional
lawyers, or turned law opposers. I hesitate not to say, it is only a
small minority, and those in general who are not entitled to the
most respect for erudition, sense, or excellence of character. The
(New School) Synod of New York and New Jersey, as respectable a body
of ministers and elders as is to be found in the Presbyterian
Church, at their late meeting in this city, had good sense enough,
and good religion enough, to "leave the constitutionality of the
recent enactment" (the Fugitive Slave Law) "to be adjudicated by the
civil tribunals of the country." They deserve the thanks of the
country and of all mankind. The solid sense and real religion of the
land will respect their decision.

I have nothing to do with politics or party. I am only insisting
upon religious obedience to Law. I am preaching the texts before me.
Such obedience is a religious duty. It is the will of God. I appeal
to the texts. They proclaim the Law of God. Peaceful subjection to
government _is_ his law; and men are guilty of sophistry and
falsehood, when, to excuse wicked evasion of Law or violent
resistance, they pretend to appeal to what they call "the higher
laws of God." _There are no such higher laws._ The texts before me
are his law. If one man has a moral right, either cunningly to evade
or openly to violate Law, under such pleading, then another man has
the same right to violate _another_ Law; and thus any villainy on
earth may be perpetrated under the sacred names of "conscience," and
"the higher laws of God!" Nothing is _safe_ in the hands of men of
such principles. These principles undermine the foundations _of all
society among men_! As I told you last Wednesday evening in my
lecture, the question before the country is _not_, (as the deceivers
pretend,) whether God's laws are not higher than man's, or whether
God's laws are to be obeyed. Nobody disputes either of these things.
Nobody ever did. But the question is, whether it is the will of God
that men should submit to the laws of the land, or aim to paralyze
law, cheat it, cripple it, resist it, and thus overthrow the
government of the country--a government at this moment more
beneficial than any other that ever existed.

Nor is it true, that the fugitive slave is made an "outlaw," and on
_that_ grou