TESTIMONY OF THE NATIONS.
To the true friends of freedom throughout the world, it is a pleasing thought, and one which, by being communicated to others, is well calculated to universalize the principles of liberty, that the great heroes, statesmen, and sages, of all ages and nations, ancient and modern, who have ever had occasion to speak of the institution of human slavery, have entered their most unequivocal and positive protests against it. To say that they disapproved of the system would not be sufficiently expressive of the utter detestation with which they uniformly regarded it. That they abhorred it as the vilest invention that the Evil-One has ever assisted bad men to concoct, is quite evident from the very tone and construction of their language.
Having, with much pleasure and profit, heard the testimony of America, through her representative men, we will now hear that of other nations, through their representative men—doubting not that we shall be more than remunerated for our time and trouble. We will first listen to
THE VOICE OF ENGLAND.
In the case of James Somerset, a negro who had been kidnapped in Africa, transported to Virginia, there sold into slavery, thence carried to England, as a waiting-boy, and there induced to institute proceedings against his master for the recovery of his freedom,
MANSFIELD says:—
“The state of slavery is of such a nature that it is incapable of being introduced on any reasons, moral or political, but only by positive law, which preserves its force long after the reasons, occasion, and time itself whence it was created, is erased from the memory. It is so odious that nothing can be sufficient to support it but positive law. Whatever inconveniences, therefore, may follow from the decision, I cannot say this case is allowed or approved by the law of England, and therefore the black must be discharged.”
LOCKE says:—
“Slavery is so vile, so miserable a state of man, and so directly opposite to the generous temper and courage of our nation, that it is hard to be convinced that an Englishman, much less a gentleman, should plead for it.”
Again, he says:—
“Though the earth, and all inferior creatures be common to all men, yet every man has a property in his own person; this nobody has any right to but himself.”
PITT says:—
“It is injustice to permit slavery to remain for a single hour.”
FOX says:—
“With regard to a regulation of slavery, my detestation of its existence induces me to know no such thing as a regulation of robbery, and a restriction of murder. Personal freedom is a right of which he who deprives a fellow-creature is criminal in so depriving him, and he who withholds is no less criminal in withholding.”
SHAKSPEARE says:—
“A man is master of his liberty.”
Again, he says:—
“It is the curse of Kings, to be attended
By slaves, that take their humors for a warrant
To break within the bloody house of life,
And, on the winking of authority,
To understand a law; to know the meaning
Of dangerous majesty, when, perchance, it frowns
More upon humor than advised respect.”
Again:—
“Heaven will one day free us from this slavery.”
Again:—
“Liberty! Freedom! Tyranny is dead!—
Run hence, proclaim, cry it about the streets;
Some to the common pulpits, and cry out,
Liberty, freedom, and enfranchisement”
COWPER says:—
“Slaves cannot breathe in England; if their lungs
Receive our air, that moment they are free.
They touch our country and their shackles fall.
That’s noble, and bespeaks a nation proud
And jealous of the blessing. Spread it then,
And let it circulate through every vein
Of all your Empire, that where Britain’s power
Is felt, mankind may feel her mercy too!”
“Where is the beauty to see,
Like the sun-brilliant brow of a nation when free?”
Again, he says:—
“If our fathers promised for themselves, to make themselves slaves, they could make no such promise for us.”
Again:—
“Since, therefore, the law is chiefly right reason, if we are bound to obey a magistrate as a minister of God, by the very same reason and the very same law, we ought to resist a tyrant, and minister of the devil.”
DR. JOHNSON says:—
“No man is by nature the property of another. The rights of nature must be some way forfeited before they can justly be taken away.”
DR. PRICE says:—
“If you have a right to make another man a slave, he has a right to make you a slave.”
BLACKSTONE says:—
“If neither captivity nor contract can, by the plain law of nature and reason, reduce the parent to a state of slavery, much less can they reduce the offspring.”
Again, he says:—
“The primary aim of society is to protect individuals in the enjoyment of those absolute rights which were vested in them by the immutable laws of nature. Hence it follows that the first and primary end of human laws is to maintain those absolute rights of individuals.”
“If any human law shall allow or require us to commit crime, we are bound to transgress that human law, or else we must offend both the natural and divine.”
COKE says:—
“What the Parliament doth, shall be holden for naught, whenever it shall enact that which is contrary to the rights of nature.”
HAMPDEN says:—
“The essence of all law is justice. What is not justice is not law; and what is not law, ought not to be obeyed.”
HARRINGTON says:—
“All men naturally, are equal; for though nature with a noble variety has made different features and lineaments of men, yet as to freedom, she has made every one alike, and given them the same desires.”
FORTESCUE says:—
“Those rights which God and nature have established, and which are therefore called natural rights, such as life and liberty, need not the aid of human laws to be more effectually invested in every man than they are; neither do they receive any additional strength when declared by the municipal laws to be inviolable. On the contrary, no human power has any authority to abridge or destroy them, unless the owner himself shall commit some act that amounts to a forfeiture.”
Again, he says:—
“The law, therefore, which supports slavery and opposes liberty, must necessarily be condemned as cruel, for every feeling of human nature advocates liberty. Slavery is introduced by human wickedness, but God advocates liberty, by the nature which he has given to man.”
“Tell me not of rights—talk not of the property of the planter in his slaves. I deny the right; I acknowledge not the property. In vain you tell me of laws that sanction such a claim. There is a law above all the enactments of human codes, the same throughout the world, the same in all times; it is the law written by the finger of God on the hearts of men; and by that law, unchangeable and eternal, while men despise fraud, and loathe rapine, and abhor blood, they shall reject with indignation the wild and guilty phantasy that man can hold property in man.”
THE VOICE OF IRELAND.
BURKE says:—
“Slavery is a state so improper, so degrading, and so ruinous to the feelings and capacities of human nature, that it ought not to be suffered to exist.”
CURRAN says:—
“I speak in the spirit of British law, which makes liberty commensurate with and inseparable from British soil; which proclaims even to the stranger and the sojourner, the moment he sets his foot upon British earth, that the ground on which he treads is holy and consecrated by the genius of Universal Emancipation. No matter in what language his doom may have been pronounced; no matter what complexion, incompatible with freedom, an Indian or African sun may have burnt upon him; no matter in what disastrous battle his liberty may have been cloven down; no matter with what solemnities he may have been devoted upon the altar of slavery, the moment he touches the sacred soil of Britain, the altar and the god sink together in the dust; his soul walks abroad in her own majesty; and he stands redeemed, regenerated and disenthralled by the irresistible genius of Universal Emancipation.”
The Dublin University Magazine for December, 1856, says:—
“The United States must learn, from the example of Rome, that Christianity and the pagan institution of slavery cannot co-exist together. The Republic must take her side and choose her favorite child; for if she love the one, she must hate the other.”
THE VOICE OF SCOTLAND.
BEATTIE says:—
“Slavery is inconsistent with the dearest and most essential rights of man’s nature; it is detrimental to virtue and industry; it hardens the heart to those tender sympathies which form the most lovely part of human character; it involves the innocent in hopeless misery, in order to procure wealth and pleasure for the authors of that misery; it seeks to degrade into brutes beings whom the Lord of Heaven and Earth endowed with rational souls, and created for immortality; in short, it is utterly repugnant to every principle of reason, religion, humanity, and conscience. It is impossible for a considerate and unprejudiced mind, to think of slavery without horror.”
MILLER says:—
“The human mind revolts at a serious discussion of the subject of slavery. Every individual, whatever be his country or complexion, is entitled to freedom.”
MACKNIGHT says:—
“Men-stealers are inserted among the daring criminals against whom the law of God directed its awful curses. These were persons who kidnapped men to sell them for slaves; and this practice seems inseparable from the other iniquities and oppressions of slavery; nor can a slave dealer easily keep free from this criminality, if indeed the receiver is as bad as the thief.”
THE VOICE OF FRANCE.
LAFAYETTE says:—
“I would never have drawn my sword in the cause of America, if I could have conceived that thereby I was founding a land of slavery.”
Again, while in the prison of Magdeburg, he says:—
“I know not what disposition has been made of my plantation at Cayenne; but I hope Madame de Lafayette will take care that the negroes who cultivate it shall preserve their liberty.”
O. LAFAYETTE, grandson of General Lafayette, in a letter under date of April 26th, 1851, says:—
“This great question of the Abolition of Negro Slavery, which has my entire sympathy, appears to me to have established its importance throughout the world. At the present time, the States of the Peninsula, if I do not deceive myself, are the only European powers who still continue to possess slaves; and America, while continuing to uphold slavery, feels daily, more and more how heavily it weighs upon her destinies.”
MONTESQUIEU asks:—
“What civil law can restrain a slave from running away, since he is not a member of society?”
Again, he says:—
“Slavery is contrary to the fundamental principles of all societies.”
Again:—
“In democracies, where they are all upon an equality, slavery is contrary to the principles of the Constitution.”
“Nothing puts one nearer the condition of a brute than always to see freemen and not be free.”
Again:—
“Even the earth itself, which teems with profusion under the cultivating hand of the free born laborer, shrinks into barrenness from the contaminating sweat of a slave.”
LOUIS X. issued the following edict:—
“As all men are by nature free born, and as this Kingdom is called the Kingdom of Franks, (freemen) it shall be so in reality. It is therefore decreed that enfranchisement shall be granted throughout the whole Kingdom upon just and reasonable terms.”
BUFFON says:—
“It is apparent that the unfortunate negroes are endowed with excellent hearts, and possess the seeds of every human virtue. I cannot write their history without lamenting their miserable condition.” “Humanity revolts at those odious oppressions that result from avarice.”
ROUSSEAU says:—
“The terms slavery and right, contradict and exclude each other.”
BRISSOT says:—
“Slavery, in all its forms, in all its degrees, is a violation of divine law, and a degradation of human nature.”
THE VOICE OF GERMANY.
GROTIUS says:—
“Those are men-stealers who abduct, keep, sell or buy slaves or free men. To steal a man is the highest kind of theft.”
“Such busy multitudes I fain would see
Stand upon free soil with a people free.”
LUTHER SAYS:—
“Unjust violence is, by no means, the ordinance of God, and therefore can bind no one in conscience and right, to obey, whether the command comes from pope, emperor, king or master.”
An able German writer of the present day, says, in a recent letter to his friends in this country:—
“Consider that the cause of American liberty is the cause of universal liberty; its failure, a triumph of despotism everywhere. Remember that while American liberty is the great argument of European Democracy, American slavery is the greater argument of its despotism. Remember that all our actions should be governed by the golden rule, whether individual, social, or political; and no government, and, above all, no republican government, is safe in the hands of men that practically deny that rule. Will you support by your vote a system that recognizes property of man in man? A system which sanctions the sale of the child by its own father, regardless of the purpose of the buyer? What need is there to present to you the unmitigated wrong of slavery? It is the shame of our age that argument is needed against slavery.
“Liberty is no exclusive property; it is the property of mankind of all ages. She is immortal, though crushed, can never die; though banished, she will return; though fettered, she will yet be free.”
THE VOICE OF ITALY.
CICERO SAYS:—
“By the grand laws of nature, all men are born free, and this law is universally binding upon all men.”
“Eternal justice is the basis of all human laws.”
Again:—
“Law is not something wrought out by man’s ingenuity, nor is it a decree of the people, but it is something eternal, governing the world by the wisdom of its commands and prohibitions.”
Again:—
“Whatever is just is also the true law, nor can this true law be abrogated by any written enactments.”
Again:—
“If there be such a power in the decrees and commands of fools, that the nature of things is changed by their votes, why do they not decree that what is bad and pernicious shall be regarded as good and wholesome, or why, if the law can make wrong right, can it not make bad good?”
Again:—
“Those who have made pernicious and unjust decrees, have made anything rather than laws.”
Again:—
“The law of all nations forbids one man to pursue his advantage at the expense of another.”
LACTANTIUS says:—
“Justice teaches men to know God and to love men, to love and assist one another, being all equally the children of God.”
LEO X. says:—
“Not only does the Christian religion, but nature herself cry out against the state of slavery.”
THE VOICE OF GREECE.
SOCRATES says:—
“Slavery is a system of outrage and robbery.”
ARISTOTLE says:—
“It is neither for the good, nor is it just, seeing all men are by nature alike, and equal, that one should be lord and master over others.”
POLYBIUS says:—
“None but unprincipled and beastly men in society assume the mastery over their fellows, as it is among bulls, bears, and cocks.”
PLATO says:—
“Slavery is a system of the most complete injustice.”
From each of the above, and from other nations, additional testimony is at hand; but, for reasons already assigned, we forbear to introduce it. Corroborative of the correctness of the position which we have assumed, even Persia has a voice, which may be easily recognized in the tones of her immortal Cyrus, who says:
“To fight, in order not to be made a slave, is noble.”
Than Great Britain no nation has more heartily or honorably repented of the crime of slavery—no nation, on the perception of its error, has ever acted with more prompt magnanimity to its outraged and unhappy bondsmen. Entered to her credit, many precious jewels of liberty remain in our possession, ready to be delivered when called for; of their value some idea may be formed, when we state that they are filigreed with such names as Wilberforce, Buxton, Granville, Grattan, Camden, Clarkson, Sharp, Sheridan, Sidney, Martin, and Macaulay.
Virginia, the Carolinas, and other Southern States, which are provided with republican (!) forms of government, and which have abolished freedom, should learn, from the history of the monarchal governments of the Old World, if not from the example of the more liberal and enlightened portions of the New, how to abolish slavery. The lesson is before them in a variety of exceedingly interesting forms, and, sooner or later, they must learn it, either voluntarily or by compulsion. Virginia, in particular, is a spoilt child, having been the pet of the General Government for the last sixty-eight years; and like most other spoilt children, she has become froward, peevish, perverse, sulky and irreverent—not caring to know her duties, and failing to perform even those which she does know. Her superiors perceive that the abolition of slavery would be a blessing to her; she is, however, either too ignorant to understand the truth, or else, as is the more probable, her false pride and obstinacy restrain her from acknowledging it. What is to be done? Shall ignorance, or prejudice, or obduracy, or willful meanness, triumph over knowledge, and liberality, and guilelessness, and laudable enterprise? No, never! Assured that Virginia and all the other slaveholding States are doing wrong every day, it is our duty to make them do right, if we have the power; and we believe we have the power now resident within their own borders. What are the opinions, generally, of the non-slaveholding whites? Let them speak.