[Footnote [86]: Pittsburg pamphlet p. 12.]
| According to Professor Hodge's account of the requisitions of Christianity, | According to Professor Hodge's definition of Slavery, |
| The spring of effort in the laborer is a fair compensation. | The laborer must serve at the discretion of another. |
| Free scope must be given for his moral and intellectual improvement. | He is deprived of personal liberty—the necessary condition, and living soul of improvement, without which he has no control of either intellect or morals. |
| His rights as a husband and a father are to be protected. | The authority and claims of the master may throw an ocean between him and his family, and separate them from each other's presence at any moment and forever. |
Christianity, then, requires such slavery as Professor Hodge so cunningly defines, to be abolished. It was well provided for the peace of the respective parties, that he placed his definition so far from the requisitions of Christianity. Had he brought them into each other's presence, their natural and invincible antipathy to each other would have broken out into open and exterminating warfare. But why should we delay longer upon an argument which is based on gross and monstrous sophistry? It can mislead only such as wish to be misled. The lovers of sunlight are in little danger of rushing into the professor's dungeon. Those who, having something to conceal, covet darkness, can find it there, to their heart's content. The hour cannot be far away, when upright and reflective minds at the South will be astonished at the blindness which could welcome such protection as the Princeton argument offers to the slaveholder.
But Professor Stuart must not be forgotten. In his celebrated letter to Dr. Fisk, he affirms that "Paul did not expect slavery to be ousted in a day."[[87]] Did not EXPECT! What then! Are the requisitions of Christianity adapted to any EXPECTATIONS which in any quarter and on any ground might have risen to human consciousness? And are we to interpret the precepts of the gospel by the expectations of Paul? The Savior commanded all men every where to repent, and this, though "Paul did not expect" that human wickedness, in its ten thousand forms would in any community "be ousted in a day." Expectations are one thing; requisitions quite another.
[Footnote [87]: Supra, p. 7.]
In the mean time, while expectation waited, Paul, the professor adds, "gave precepts to Christians respecting their demeanor." That he did. Of what character were these precepts? Must they not have been in harmony with the Golden Rule? But this, according to Professor Stuart, "decides against the righteousness of slavery" even as a "theory." Accordingly, Christians were required, without respect of persons, to do each other justice—to maintain equality as common ground for all to stand upon—to cherish and express in all their intercourse that tender love and disinterested charity which one brother naturally feels for another. These were the "ad interim precepts."[[88]] which cannot fail, if obeyed, to cut up slavery, "root and branch," at once and forever.
[Footnote [88]: Letter to Dr. Fisk, p. 7.]
Professor Stuart comforts us with the assurance that "Christianity will ultimately certainly destroy slavery." Of this we have not the feeblest doubt. But how could he admit a persuasion and utter a prediction so much at war with the doctrine he maintains, that "slavery may exist without VIOLATING THE CHRISTIAN FAITH OR THE CHURCH?"[[89]] What, Christianity bent on the destruction of an ancient and cherished institution which hurts neither her character nor condition?[[90]] Why not correct its abuses and purify its spirit; and shedding upon it her own beauty, preserve it, as a living trophy of her reformatory power? Whence the discovery that, in her onward progress, she would trample down and destroy what was no way hurtful to her? This is to be aggressive with a witness. Far be it from the Judge of all the earth to whelm the innocent and guilty in the same destruction! In aid of Professor Stuart, in the rude and scarcely covert attack which he makes upon himself, we maintain that Christianity will certainly destroy slavery on account of its inherent wickedness—its malignant temper—its deadly effects—its constitutional, insolent, and unmitigable opposition to the authority of God and the welfare of man.
[Footnote [89]: Letter to Dr. Fisk, p. 7.]
[Footnote [90]: Professor Stuart applies here the words, salva fide et salva ecclesia.]