Authority usurped, from God not given!
He gave us only over beast, fish, fowl
Dominion absolute; that right we hold
By his donation; but man over men
He made not lord, such title to himself
Reserving, human left from human free."[170]
Such a God-defying relation could not fail to accumulate disaster upon all in any way parties to it; for injustice and wrong are fatal alike to doer and sufferer. Notoriously in Algiers it exerted a most pernicious influence on master as well as slave. The slave was crushed and degraded, his intelligence abased, even his love of freedom extinguished. The master, accustomed from childhood to revolting inequalities of condition, was exalted into a mood of unconscious arrogance and self-confidence inconsistent with the virtues of a pure and upright character. Unlimited power is apt to stretch towards license; and the wives and daughters of white slaves were often pressed to be the concubines of Algerine masters.[171]
It is well, then, that it has passed away. The Barbary States seem less barbarous, when we no longer discern this cruel oppression.