y promise, without
adverting to your many and great obligations to me, to pay you every
cent which he took from your drawer. Any preparation which my
comfort with you may require, you will make without much delay, when
you learn, that I intend, as soon as I shall be able 'to perform the
journey,' to make you a visit."
And what if Dr. Baxter, in giving an account of this letter should
publicly declare that Professor Stuart, of Andover regarded
slaveholding as lawful; for that "he had sent Archy back to his son
Isaac, with an apology for his running away" to be held in perpetual
slavery? With what propriety might not the professor exclaim: False,
every syllable false. I sent him back, NOT TO BE HELD AS A SLAVE,
_but recognized as a dear brother, in all respects, under every
relation, civil and ecclesiastical_. I bade my son receive _Archy as
myself_. If this was not equivalent to a requisition to set him
fully and most honorably free, and that, too, on the ground of
natural obligation and Christian principle, then I know not how to
frame such a requisition.
I am well aware that my supposition is by no means strong enough
fully to illustrate the case to which it is applied. Professor Stuart
lacks apostolical authority. Isaac Stuart is not a leading member of
a church consisting, as the early churches chiefly consisted, of
what the world regard as the dregs of society--"the offscouring of
all things." Nor was slavery at Colosse, it seems, supported by such
barbarous usages, such horrid laws as disgrace the South.
But it is time to turn to another passage which, in its bearing on
the subject in hand, is, in our view, as well as in the view of
Dr. Fisk. and Prof. Stuart, in the highest degree authoritative and
instructive. "Let as many servants as are under the yoke count their
own masters worthy of all honor, that the name of God and his
doctrines be not blasphemed. And they that have believing masters,
let them not despise them because they are brethren; but rather do
them service, because they are faithful and beloved, partakers of
the benefit." [44]
[Footnote 44: 1 Tim. vi. 1. 2. The following exposition of this
passage is from the pen of ELIZUR WRIGHT, JR.:--
"This word [Greek: antilambanesthai] in our humble opinion, has been
so unfairly used by the commentators, that we feel constrained to
take its part. Our excellent translators, in rendering the clause
'partakers of the benefit,' evidently lost si
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