V. THE CRIME OF SLAVE-HOLDING SANCTIONED BY THE BIBLE.
The Bible contains a warrant for the perpetual enslavement of men, women, and children. It is well known to the pioneer-laborers in the antislavery reform, that this book constituted a strong bulwark in support of the system; that it was one of the principal obstacles in the way of effecting its extermination.
Its defenders quoted such texts as the following: "Of the heathen round about you, shall ye buy bondmen and bond maids, and they shall be your possession for ever" (Lev. xxv. 44). Among Christian professors, such positive and explicit license for the practice of slave-holding was hard to be set aside; and it undoubtedly had an influence to perpetuate the accursed system of slavery.