of Georgia
went down before the army that represented justice and freedom and the
authority of national law, the vanquished and retreating soldiers of a
lost cause could not be accused of superstition if they remembered that
the scene of their humiliating defeat had received its name from the
martyrdom of Christian missionaries at the hands of their fathers.

* * * * *

In earlier pages we have already traced the succession of bold protests
and organized labors on the part of church and clergy against the
institution of slavery.[268:1] If protest and argument against it seem
to be less frequent in the early years of the new century, it is only
because debate must needs languish when there is no antagonist. Slavery
had at that time no defenders in the church. No body of men in 1818 more
unmistakably represented the Christian citizenship of the whole country,
North, South, and West, outside of New England, than the General
Assembly of the then undivided Presbyterian Church. In that year the
Assembly set forth a full and unanimous expression of its sentiments on
the subject of slavery, addressed "to the churches and people under its
care." This monumental document is too long to be cited here in full.
The opening paragraphs of it exhibit the universally accepted sentiment
of American Christians of that time:

"We consider the voluntary enslaving of one part of the human
race by another as a gross violation of the most precious and
sacred rights of human nature; as utterly inconsistent with
the law of God, which requires us to love our neighbor as
ourselves; and as totally irreconcilable with the spirit and
principles of the gospel of Christ, which enjoin that 'all
things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye
even so to them.' Slavery creates a paradox in the moral
system. It exhibits rational, accountable, and immortal beings
in such circumstances as scarcely to leave them the power of
moral action. It exhibits them as dependent on the will of
others whether they shall receive religious instruction;
whether they shall know and worship the true God; whether they
shall enjoy the ordinances of the gospel; whether they shall
perform the duties and cherish the endearments of husbands and
wives, parents and children, neighbors and friends; whether
they shall preserve their chastity and purity or