“And if the servant shall plainly say, ‘I love my master * * * I will not go out free:’ then his master shall bring him * * * and he shall serve (be a slave to) him for ever.”
But if it shall be said the value of the passage quoted resides in the term “violent compulsion;” that “violent compulsion,” sufficient to make a man a slave, is incompatible with the law of God, then it will have no weight in the argument, because the “violent compulsion” used may be in conformity to the law of God. “And I will cause thee to serve (be a slave) to thine enemies in the land which thou knowest not.”
“An individual may indeed forfeit his liberty by crime, but he cannot forfeit the liberty of his children.”
This, as a proposition, presents a sophism of the order non causa pro causa, in reverse. We all agree a man may forfeit his liberty by crime; but how are we to deduce from this fact that the liberty of the child cannot be affected by the same crime? The truth is, the crime that deprives a parent of liberty, may, or may not, deprive the child. The framework of this sophism is quite subtle; it implies the sophism, “a dicto secundum quid, ad dictum simpliciter,” to have full effect on the mind. Because, in truth, the crime that deprives the parent of liberty does not invariably involve the liberty of the child, we are, therefore, asked to assent to the proposition that it never does. But, perhaps, an analysis of the proposition before us may be more plain to some, when we remark, what is true in all such compound sophisms, that the proposition containing it is divisible into two distinct propositions.
In this case, the first one is true,—the second not. If, by crime, a man forfeits his life, he forfeits his liberty. If he is put to death previous to a condition of paternity, its prospect is cut off with him. Those beings who, otherwise, might have been his descendants, will never exist. Hence rude nations, from such analogy, in case of very high crimes, destroyed, with the parent, all his existing descendants. Ancient history is full of such examples. The principle is the same as the more modern attaint, and is founded, if in no higher law, in the common sense of mankind; for, when the statute establishing attaints is repealed, the public mind and the descendant both feel that the attaint essentially exists, even without law to enforce it. Who does not perceive that the descendants of certain traitors are effectually attainted at the present day, even among the most enlightened nations. He who denies that the crime of the parent can affect the liberty of the child, must also deny that the character of the parent can affect him; a fact that almost universally exists, and which every one knows.
“Let his children be continually vagabonds and beg; * * * let his posterity be cut off; * * * let the iniquities of his fathers be remembered with the Lord.”
This doctrine was recognised and practised by the church, even in England, in the more early ages. Let one instance suffice. About the year 560, Mauricus, a Christian king of Wales, committed perjury and murdered Cynetus,—whereupon, Odouceus, Bishop of Llandaff, in full synod, pronounced excommunication, and cursed, for ever, him and all his offspring. See Milton’s ΕΙΚΟΝΟΚΛΑΣΤΗΣ, cap. 28.
This principle actively exists in the physical world. The parent contracts some loathsome disease—the offspring are physically deteriorated thereby. He whose moral and physical degradation are such that slavery to him is a blessing, with few exceptions, will find his descendants fit only for that condition. The children of parents whose conduct in life fostered some mental peculiarity, are quite likely, with greater or less intensity, to exhibit traces of the same. “The parents have eaten sour grapes, and the children’s teeth are set on edge.” The law is not repealed by the mantle of love, which, in mercy, the Saviour has spread over the world, any more than forgiveness blots out the fact of a crime. The hope of happiness hereafter alleviates present suffering, but, in no sense, annihilates a cause which has previously existed.
“A man may accept life from a conquering enemy on condition of perpetual servitude; but it is very doubtful whether he can entail that servitude on his descendants; for no man can stipulate, without commission, for another.”
All that is presented as argument here, is founded upon the proposition, that no man can stipulate for his descendants, whether unborn or not.