CHAPTER VIII.
THE TENURE.
"One part, one little part, we dimly scan
Through the dark medium of life's fevering dream;
Yet dare arraign the whole stupendous plan
If but that little part incongruous seem;
Nor is that part, perhaps, what mortals deem;
Oft from apparent ill our blessings rise."—BEATTIE, Minstrel.
Mr. North then said, "Let us change the subject a little. Please to tell us why, in your view, any slave who is so disposed may not run away. Would you not do so, if you were a slave, and were oppressed, or thought that you could mend your condition? Where did my master get his right and title to me? God did not institute American slavery as he did slavery among the Hebrews. If I were a slave to certain masters, South or North, I should probably run away at all hazards. I should not stop to debate the morality of the act. No human being would, in his heart blame me. It would be human nature, resisting under the infliction of pain. We catch hold of a dentist's hand when he is drawing a tooth. Perhaps there may be found some moral law against doing so!"
"But we are apt," said I, "to take these exceptional cases, and make a rule that includes them and all others. I have been present when intelligent gentlemen, Northerners and Southerners, have discussed this subject in the most friendly manner, though with great earnestness. Once I remember we spent an evening discussing the subject. I will, if you please, tell you about the conversation.
"I must take you, then, to an old mansion at the South, around which, and at such a distance from each other as to reveal a fine prospect, stood a growth of noble elms, a lawn spreading itself out before the house, and the large hall, or entry, serving for a tea-room, where seven or eight gentlemen, and as many ladies were assembled.
"A Southern physician, who had no slaves, took the ground that all the slaves had a right to walk off whenever they pleased. He did not see why we should hold them in bondage rather than they us, so far as right and justice were concerned. Some of the slave-holders were evidently much troubled in their thoughts, and did not speak strongly. My own feelings at first went with the physician and with his arguments; but I saw that he was not very clear, nor deep, and his friends who partly yielded to him, seemed to do so rather under the influence of conscientious feelings, than from any very well defined principles. This is the case with not a few at the South, and it was very common in Thomas Jefferson's days. But the large majority, who were of the contrary opinion, got the advantage in the argument, and it seemed to me went far toward convincing the physician, as they did me, that he was wrong.
"The company all seemed to look toward a judge who was present, to open the discussion with a statement of his views. He did so by saying, for substance, as follows:—
"'I will take it for granted,' said he, 'that we are agreed as to the unlawfulness of the slave-trade, past and present. We find the blacks here, as we come upon the stage. We are born into this relationship. It is an existing form of government in the Slave States.
"'Ownership in man is not contrary to the will of God. I also find it written that "Canaan shall be a servant." Hear these words of inspiration: "Cursed be Canaan; a servant of servants shall he be unto his brethren. And he said, Blessed be the Lord God of Shem; and Canaan shall be his servant. God shall enlarge Japheth, and he shall dwell in the tents of Shem; and Canaan shall be his servant." As the Japhetic race is to dwell in the tents of Shem, for example, England occupying India, so I believe the black race is under the divine sentence of servitude. Moreover, being perfectly convinced of the wrongfulness and the infinite mischief to all concerned of the forcible liberation of our slaves, I am assisted in settling, in my own mind, the question as to me right of individual slaves to escape from service, and our right to continue in this relationship, conforming ourselves in it always to the golden rule.