[265] Elements of Moral Science, p. 225.
[266] It need hardly be remarked, that the command to obey magistrates, as given in Rom. xiii: 1-3, is subject to the limitation stated above. They are to be obeyed as magistrates; precisely as parents are to be obeyed as parents, husbands as husbands. The command of obedience is expressed as generally, in the last two cases, as in the first. A magistrate beyond the limits of his lawful authority (whatever that may be), has, in virtue of this text, no more claim to obedience, than a parent who, on the strength of the passage "Children, obey your parents in all things," should command his son to obey him as a monarch or a pope.
[267] Quoted by Pres. Young, p. 45, of the Address, etc.
[268] On the manner in which slaves were acquired, compare Deut. xx: 14. xxi: 10, 11. Ex. xxii: 3. Neh. v: 4, 5. Gen. xiv: 14. xv: 3. xvii: 23. Num. xxxi: 18, 35. Deut. xxv: 44, 46.
As to the manner in which they were to be treated, see Lev. xxv: 39-53. Ex. xx: 10. xxii: 2-8. Deut. xxv: 4-6, etc. etc.
[269] "The word of Christ, (Matt. xix; 9), may be construed by an easy implication to prohibit polygamy: for if 'whoever putteth away his wife, and marrieth another committeth adultery' he who marrieth another without putting away the first, is no less guilty of adultery: because the adultery does not consist in the repudiation of the first wife, (for, however unjust and cruel that may be, it is not adultery), but in entering into a second marriage during the legal existence and obligation of the first. The several passages in St. Paul's writings, which speak of marriage, always suppose it to signify the union of one man with one woman."—Paley's Moral Phil., book iii, chap. 6.
[270] Elements of Moral Science, p. 221.
[271] Clarkson and Wilberforce were anxious, to have the slave trade speedily abolished, lest the force of their arguments should be weakened by its amelioration.—Ed.
[272] If the negro is susceptible of this degree of improvement, he ought then to be free.—Ed.
[273] Abolition has impeded this improvement.—Ed.