The author has also analyzed the fountain of Moral Philosophy, and detected the bitter waters of error so industriously infused by the eloquent and magical pens of such writers as Dr. Samuel Johnson, Dr. Paley, Dr. Channing, Dr. Wayland, Mr. Barnes, and others. He has confined himself to the moral and ethical bearings of the question, scarcely touching upon its political aspects,—a course calculated to render the book far more useful to the dispassionate seekers after truth, who may belong to different political sects.
Neither time nor labour has been spared in the authorship of the work; and it is believed that, while it is written with candour and calmness, it will be received by the people of the North as well as of the South as a sincere and enlightened endeavour to seek for truth, and thus allay the tumultuous and disorganizing fanaticism of those who have not had opportunity to study the subject, and are incapable of acting upon it with understanding and true decision.
PROEMIAL
Philosophy knows no obligation that binds one man to another without an equivalent. If one man could be subjected to another, who is not bound to render any thing in return, it would be subversive to good morals and political justice. Such a relation cannot exist, only so far as to reach the immediate death of the subjected. But it has been the error of some good men to suppose that slavery presented such a case. It has been their misfortune also to receive the following succedaneums as axioms in the search for truth:—
“All men are born equal.”
“The rights of men are inalienable.”
“No man has power to alienate a natural right.”
“No man can become property.”
“No man can own property in another.”
“The conscience is a distinct mental faculty.”