world. They knew the history of human slavery.

The history of civilization is the history of the slow and painful
enfranchisement of the human race. In the olden times the family was a
monarchy, the farther being the monarch. The mother and children were
the veriest slaves. The will of the father was the supreme law. He had
the power of life and death. It took thousands of years to civilize this
father, thousands of years to make the condition of wife and mother and
child even tolerable. A few families constituted a tribe; the tribe
had a chief; the chief was a tyrant; a few tribes formed a nation; the
nation was governed by a king, who was also a tyrant, A strong nation
robbed, plundered, and took captive the weaker ones. This was the
commencement of human slavery.

It is not possible for the human imagination to conceive of the horrors
of slavery. It has left no possible crime uncommitted, no possible
cruelty unperpetrated. It has been practised and defended by all nations
in some form. It has been upheld by all religions. It has been defended
by nearly every pulpit. From the profits derived from the slave trade
churches have been built, cathedrals reared and priests paid. Slavery
has been blessed by bishop, by cardinal, and by pope. It has received
the sanction of statesmen, of kings, and of queens. It has been defended
by the throne, the pulpit, and the bench. Monarchs have shared in the
profits. Clergymen have taken their part of the spoil, reciting passages
of scripture in its defense at the same time, and judges have taken
their portion in the name of equity and law.

Only a few years ago our ancestors were slaves. Only a few years ago
they passed with and belonged to the soil, like coal under it and rocks
on it. Only a few years ago they were treated like beasts of burden,
worse far than we treat our animals at the present day. Only a few years
ago it was a crime in England for a man to have a bible in his house,
a crime for which men were hanged, and their bodies afterwards burned.
Only a few years ago fathers could and did sell their children. Only
a few years ago our ancestors were not allowed to speak or write their
thoughts--that being a crime. Only a few years ago to be honest, at
least in the expression of your ideas, was a felony. To do right was a
capital offense; and in those days chains and whips were the incentives
to labor, and the preventives of thought. Honesty was a vagrant,
justice a fugitiv