er, and the mount quaked and blazed, God
spake the ten commandments from the midst of clouds and thunderings.
_Two_ of those commandments deal death to slavery. "THOU SHALT NOT
STEAL," or, "thou shalt not take from another what belongs to him." All
man's powers are God's gift to _him_. That they are _his own_, is proved
from the fact that God has given them to _him alone_,--that each of them
is a part of himself, and all of them together constitute himself. All
else that belongs to man, is acquired by the _use_ of these powers. The
interest belongs to him, because the principal does; the product is his,
because he is the producer. Ownership of any thing, is ownership of its
_use_. The right to use according to will, is _itself_ ownership. The
eighth commandment presupposes and assumes the right of every man to his
powers, and their product. Slavery robs of both. A man's right to
himself, is the only right absolutely original and intrinsic--his right
to whatever else that belongs to him is merely _relative_ to this, is
derived from it, and held only by virtue of it. SELF-RIGHT is the
_foundation right_--the _post is the middle_, to which all other rights
are fastened. Slaveholders, when talking about their RIGHT to their
slaves, always assume their own right to themselves. What slaveholder
ever undertook to prove his right to himself? He knows it to be a
self-evident proposition, that _a man belongs to himself_--that the
right is intrinsic and absolute. In making out his own title, he makes
out the title of every human being. As the fact of being a _man_ is
itself the title, the whole human family have one common title deed. If
one man's title is valid, all are valid. If one is worthless, all are.
To deny the validity of the _slave's_ title is to deny the validity of
_his own_; and yet in the act of making a man a slave, the slaveholder
_asserts_ the validity of his own title, while he seizes him as his
property who has the _same_ title. Further, in making him a slave, he
does not merely disfranchise the humanity of _one_ individual, but of
UNIVERSAL MAN. He destroys the foundations. He annihilates _all rights_.
He attacks not only the human race, but _universal being_, and rushes
upon JEHOVAH. For rights are _rights_; God's are no more--man's are no
less.

[Footnote A: The Bible record of actions is no comment on their moral
character. It vouches for them as _facts_, not as _virtues_. It records
without rebuke, Noah's d