But if the
Apostles were not slaveholders, why may we suppose, that their disciples
were? At the South, it is, "like people, like priest," in this matter.
There, the minister of the gospel thinks, that he has as good right to
hold slaves, as has his parishioner: and your Methodists go so far, as
to say, that even a bishop has as good right, as any other person, to
have slaves
[Footnote B: How strongly does the following extract from the writings
of the great and good Augustine, who lived in the fourth century, argue,
that slaveholding was not a prevalent sin amongst primitive Christians!
"Non opurtet Christianum possidere servum quomodo equum aut argentum.
Quis dicere audeat ut vestimentum cum debere contemni? Hominem namque
homo tamquam seipsum diligere debet cui ab omnium Domino, ut inimicos
diligat, imperatur." _A Christian ought not to hold his servant as he
does his horse or his money. Who dares say that he should be thought as
lightly of as a garment? For man, whom the Lord of all has commanded to
love his enemies, should love his fellow-man as himself._]
"------to fan him while he sleeps,
And tremble when he wakes.
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