open to a wise choice
than that which was actually adopted. I contend, that in not
passionately denouncing slavery, and in contenting themselves with
quietly depositing those principles and sentiments which, while
achieving objects infinitely more important, would infallibly abolish
it, the Apostles took the wisest course, even with relation to this
latter object,--though it was doubtless not the course into which a
blind fanaticism would have plunged. To enter upon an open crusade
against slavery in that age would have been to render the preaching of
the Gospel a simple impossibility, and to convert a professedly moral
and spiritual institute into an engine of political agitation; it would
have afforded the indignant governments of the world--quite prompt enough
to charge it with seditious tendencies--a plausible pretext for its
suppression. Both the primary and the secondary objects would have been
sacrificed; and the chains of slavery riveted, not relaxed. Slavery,
in that age, we must recollect, was interwoven with the entire fabric of
society in almost all nations. To denounce it would have been a
provocation, nay, a challenge, to a servile war in every country to
which the zeal of the Christian emissaries might carry the Gospel.
Contenting themselves, therefore, with the enunciation of those
principles which, where they are truly embraced, are inconsistent
with the permanent existence of slavery, and, if triumphant, insure
its downfall, the Apostles pursued that which was their great object;
and for those of an inferior order, patiently waited for the time
when the seed they had sown broadcast in the earth should
yield its harvest.

And surely the event has justified their sagacity. For to what, after
all, have just notions on this most important subject been owing,
except to this said Christianity? Though it is true that, owing to the
imperfect exemplification of its principles by men who profess it, it
has not yet done its work, it is doing it; though some Christian
nations--more shame for them--have slaves, none but Christian nations
are without them. Not only is the sincere admission of the maxims and
principles of the New Testament inconsistent with the permanent
existence of slavery, but the history of Christianity affords perpetual
illustrations of its tendency to destroy it. Even during the Dark Ages,
even in its most corrupted form, Christianity wrought for the practical
extinction of serfdom. Mr. Newman