Let not Papists, who, at the distance of a few days' sail from your ports, would deny your brother the rights of Christian interment, or the consolation of dying with his Bible in his hand, dare call upon your aid, to propagate a religion, which inculcates principles worse and more dangerous than were ever practised in Pagan lands.
Much sympathy is felt and expressed, particularly in this state of Massachusetts, where I write for some of her colored population, because it is deemed necessary, in slave states, to prevent them from commingling with their slaves, lest they may excite them to dissatisfaction with their condition, and ultimately to insurrection. It is deemed a matter of such magnitude that Massachusetts, in the plenitude of its sympathy, felt herself called upon to send an ambassador to South Carolina, to protect her citizens, and demand redress for this supposed outrage upon her rights. It is not my intention to enter into the merits or demerits of the question at issue between the states of Massachusetts and South Carolina. I will merely state, that the former consists in this, viz: by a law of the state of South Carolina, every free person of color, entering that state, is liable to be imprisoned till he leaves the state. This is done by South Carolina and some other slave states, as a necessary measure of precaution; but the prisoner is kindly treated; at least, we hear nothing to the contrary; no such complaint is made by Massachusetts. The prisoner is allowed the free exercise of his religion; his friends may visit him almost at any hour; his spiritual instructor is never denied access to him; he may have his Bible with him, or any other books he may think proper. But this will not satisfy the sympathizing people of Massachusetts. They call public meetings of their citizens; threaten to dissolve the union; and declare they will raise a sufficient military force to invade South Carolina, and redress this outrage upon a citizen's rights, at the point of the bayonet.
Man is truly a strange being, and various indeed are the currents of his sympathies, but still more various and unaccountable are the causes which often set them in motion. It is comparatively but seldom, that a colored citizen of the North goes to slave states; but if there should be the least infraction of his civil rights, the whole North flies into a passion; and yet this very people of the North can see the citizens of their own country, kindred, and blood, in a neighboring Popish port of Havana, for instance, deprived of all their rights, both conventional and natural, without a murmur. Not a complaint is heard in New England, from the son, whose father is confined in the dungeons of Cuba, not because he is suspected of any intention to create insurrection, but simply because he refused to kneel to some wooden image, which a parcel of debauched priests are lugging about the streets; or because he expresses his belief that such processions and mummeries are worse than Pagan idolatry.
The American Protestant, who will dare worship his God publicly, or even in private, within the walls of his own house, unless with closed doors, and without the knowledge of the Popish spies of the Inquisition, is liable to imprisonment, from which, in all probability, he is never to be released. If a Bible be found in his house, it is burned, and he and his family are cast into jail. This is the case in every country where the Popish church has power enough to make its religion that of the state; and yet we have treaties of amity, with these countries. What a burlesque upon amity! what a mockery of friendly relations, with a people who deny us the exercise of the natural right which every man has, to worship God as he pleases! who compel our fathers, brothers, and our sons, to bow the knee, in idolatrous worship, to wooden images, and particles of bread, which are paraded as Gods, through the streets, in Roman Catholic countries. Friendly relations, forsooth, with a people who consider us damned, and already consigned to perdition! And yet we hear no complaint in Massachusetts, of cruelties to our citizens; nothing is said of the violation of those friendly relations, secured to us by treaty, and annually declared by our presidents, in their messages, to exist and to be maintained between our people and those Popish countries. When we hear of an American citizen in Cuba, when we hear of his natural rights being trampled under foot, by Catholic governors, bishops, and priests, no complaint is made of a violation of friendly alliance; no meeting is called to express sympathy for the individual sufferer, or indignation against the treacherous government of Popery; no act of our legislature has been passed, making appropriations to send ambassadors to these neighboring nations, for injuries done to our citizens; and yet it is a well-known fact, that where one colored citizen of New England is imprisoned, for a few days, in South Carolina, there are a thousand of our enterprising seamen and merchants, confined in the dungeons of Spain, Italy, Portugal, Mexico, and Cuba, at our very door. How long will these outrages be tolerated? A Popish captain comes here; the hands before the mast are Papists; the ship may have her chaplain, or may have as many little gods, and saints, indulgences, scapulas, beads, and rosaries, as they please; they may land, captain, crew, saints, and all, and no one molests them; but if an American ship arrives at the very port from which the other sailed, her captain and crew are forbidden even to carry their Bible on shore; but should the ship have a Protestant chaplain, and that chaplain venture on shore, with his congregation of sailors—all American freemen—he dare not take his Bible with him, or hold religious worship on this Popish soil; and should this captain, chaplain, or any of the crew die, he is not allowed Christian burial, unless he can buy the privilege from, profligate priests, at an enormous sacrifice of money, and after certain purifications effected by holy water, and smoking, which they call incense. This is what our government calls friendly relations.
How long shall we be amused by the executive messages, annually informing us of receiving "assurances of friendship from Popish countries?" Let the people take this subject into their own hands; let them have no alliance, no treaty, no commerce with a people, who will deny them the right of worshipping God peaceably and respectfully, or who will refuse them the right of burying their dead decently and with due solemnity. The treaties which are made with Papists begin, on their part, with the most solemn avowal of good faith, in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. They assure us of their friendly sentiments towards us under this solemn and awful sanction; but no sooner is this promise made—no sooner have they pledged their honor, their faith, and all that is holy, to support it—than they disregard all those obligations, feeling and believing that they are already dispensed with by their church, which teaches them to hold no faith with heretics. The priests, however, and bishops, more crafty than the mass of their people, plead state necessity for withholding from us privileges which we give them. This is a shallow pretext, and worthy only of the source from which it comes. Can any case be supposed, or any necessity arise, to violate the eternal principles of right and wrong, of justice and truth? Are moral and national obligations anything more than mere dead letters and leaden rules, which can be bent by hands strong enough to do so, and to suit their own purposes and designs?
Suppose a man in private life—suppose further that man to be a Papist—he enters into a treaty of alliance and friendship with a Protestant; he calls God the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost to witness that he will fulfil his engagement; we can easily fancy the Protestant, within the jurisdiction of that Papist, reading his Bible, without interfering or any way molesting the individual within whose jurisdiction he is. Let us imagine this Protestant seized by the Papist, thrown into prison by him, while alive, and if dead, thrown away as food for the birds of prey. Would you call this fulfilling the obligations of friendship or friendly alliance? Would the Protestant ever enter into such a treaty of alliance again? Would not every Protestant who witnessed this transaction look upon the Papist who committed it, even though he be but a private individual, as a bad man, with whom no further intercourse ought to be had? Assuredly, he would. But let it be borne in mind, that actions do not change their nature; immutable principles are always the same; they do not change with the paucity or number of actors; what is bad in an individual will be wrong in a nation, and in every individual of that nation. The only difference is, that an act of perfidy and bad faith in a nation is, if possible, worse in itself, and infinitely more mischievous, than if committed by an individual.
Our political sophists may deny this, and gloss over the conduct of Popish governments towards our citizens while among them; but they cannot long hide from our people that the eternal laws of truth cannot be violated; nor can their meaning be frittered away by the technicalities of treaties. Truth, whether moral or political, is like the suu of heaven; it is but one—it is the same every where. It is sometimes clouded, it is true, but these clouds are momentary; they pass away, and it shines again in its native brilliancy. The day is fast coming, and I trust it has even arrived, when Americans will see, that by a treaty of amity is not meant the right of shipping our commodities to Popish countries, and receiving theirs in exchange; reserving to one party the privilege of denying to the other a right dearer to him than all earthly considerations; and which is guarantied to him by the eternal laws of God, while the other party is under no restraint as to the full and free enjoyment of those natural rights. And here, I beg leave to say to our legislators, that Protestant Americans, upon due reflection, will not long give their assent to any treaty, nor form an alliance with any country, which shall deny them the free exercise of their religion.
The American, who will enter into an alliance with the Pope, or a Popish country, explicitly agrees to deny his God, and forswear the religion of his forefathers. He virtually consents that the party with which he makes the agreement shall be privileged to curse and damn him, his country, his religion, and his rights. This needs no proof. Look around you, and see your citizens in Mexico denying their God by submitting to Popish laws, which forbid their worship according to the dictates of their conscience. Were your puritan forefathers to witness this, would they not exclaim, "Shame upon our degenerate sons, who will barter their religion and their birthright for the petty advantages of commerce!" No wonder that Popish priests and Popish presses should call Americans cowards and the sons of cowards. Who but a coward, and what but a nation of cowards, would surrender that liberty of conscience which their forefathers purchased at the price of blood? This Americans do by assenting to a treaty with any country which does not guarantee to them the right of worshipping God without hindrance. Americans will not forget, though they cannot too often be reminded of the fact, that those countries where their feelings are thus outraged are, de facto, governed by the Pope and his vicegerents, whose actions for centuries back have proved them to have been no other than conspirators against the improvement and happiness of the human race. What were the means by which they conducted their governments? The very same that they are now in every Roman Catholic country, all over the globe; craft, dissimulation, oppression, extortion, and above all, fire, faggot, and the sword. There is not an article of their faith, nor a sacrament of their church, which is not enforced by curses, as I shall show in the sequel. These vicegerents of the humble Redeemer have the insolence to ape the very thunders of heaven. History informs us, that their robes have been crimsoned in blood. Their images of saints, some of which I have seen in Mexico, made of solid gold, and many of them six feet high and well-proportioned, were wrung from the poor.
Many of those countries, which they now possess, and where God and nature have scattered plenty, have been made barren by Popish avarice and the licentiousness of its priests. The fields, which laughed with plenty, they have watered with hunger and distress. They found the world gay with flowers, and with roses: they dyed it with blood. They and their doctrines acted upon it like the blast of an east wind. Popery, since the eighth century in particular, has been what a pestilence or conflagration is to a city.
Come with me, in imagination, to Italy, and judge for yourselves. Pass on with me, to Spain, Portugal, South America, and you will sec that I am not exaggerating. You will find that I have only told truth, but not the whole truth. No tongue can tell it. We have no language to express it. I will give you a few instances of the fruits of Popery in the neighboring island of Cuba. What I am about stating has come under my own observation; and is, besides, a matter of record, and accessible to many. The natives of Cuba pay fifteen millions per annum to her most Christian Majesty, the queen of Spain. They support an army of sixteen thousand men, every one of whom is a native of old Spain, kept there for the sole purpose of extorting this enormous annual tribute. The number of priests there is immense. They, too, must be supported at the point of the bayonet. These priests are known to be the most profligate vagabonds in creation. And why, it will naturally be asked, should such men be tolerated? Why supply them with money to gamble at the faro table, at cock-fights and bull-fights? The reason is plain; they act as spies for the Pope, who, in reality, manages the government of old Spain, and contrives to draw, from that already impoverished and distracted country, the last dollar of a people whom God has endowed with every virtue, and a capacity of cultivating them, had not the curse of Popery fallen upon them.